Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

MOTOR VEHICLES (OFFENCES)

Address for Return showing the number of offences relating to motor vehicles in England and Wales, the number of persons prosecuted for such offences, the results of the proceedings in magistrates' courts, and the number of alleged offences in respect of which written warnings were issued by the police, together with the number of persons concerned, during 1954.—[Sir H. Lucas-Tooth.]

Oral Answers to Questions — EMPLOYMENT

Industrial Relations

Captain Pilkington: asked the Minister of Labour whether he will make a statement regarding talks held with a view to decreasing the number of strikes.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour and National Service (Mr. Harold Watkinson): Following the informal exploratory talks which the Prime Minister had this summer with the representatives of the British Employers' Confederation, the Trades Union Congress and the nationalised industries, my right hon. and learned Friend has had further discussions on industrial relations on the National Joint Advisory Council and the Joint Consultative Committee, which is a rather smaller body. The talks are to continue. There is agreement that the right approach to these matters does not lie in new legislation of a general nature. It would be a misconception to expect these talks to produce a general solution of problems which by their nature must be the particular care and constant

responsibility of individual industries and establishments, but my right hon. and learned Friend hopes that the talks will result in giving valuable guidance on principles and methods for establishing and maintaining sound industrial relations.

Captain Pilkington: Whilst much appreciating what is being done by the Ministry of Labour, by employers and by employees, may I ask my hon. Friend whether he agrees that, because we depend so much on export markets in this country, our people are injured so much more by strikes than are most countries?

Mr. Watkinson: Certainly I agree that our economy is more vulnerable than that of most other countries, and that is the reason the members of the Joint Consultative Committee are giving this problem such serious attention.

Mr. H. Hynd: Does the Minister realise that the new increases in Purchase Tax and rents are likely to lead to industrial unrest?

Mr. Watkinson: That is quite another matter and not a subject which the Committee is discussing.

Mr. Anthony Greenwood: In order that we should keep this problem in its right perspective, would not the Parliamentary Secretary agree that our record for industrial disputes over the last few years compares very favourably with our record in pre-war years, and also very favourably with those of most industrial countries in a comparable period?

Mr. Watkinson: Yes, the hon. Gentleman is entirely right; we have nothing to fear in comparison with other countries, but it still remains true that our economy is very vulnerable and that in the national interest we cannot afford the kind of stoppages that we have had on the railways and in the docks this year.

Industrial Health Advisory Committee (Recommendations)

Dr. Stross: asked the Minister of Labour what progress has been made towards the establishment of an industrial health service.

Mr. Watkinson: My right hon. and learned Friend has established an Industrial Health Advisory Committee to advise him on measures to further the


development of industrial health services in work places covered by the Factories Acts. Four meetings of this Committee have been held. Priorities for action recommended by the Committee include the stimulation of voluntary medical supervision in a number of industries with serious health hazards; the substitution by industry of harmless or less harmful materials for those that are harmful; the protection of workers from ionising radiations; a campaign against dermatitis; and the intensification of investigation and research into industrial health problems. On the advice of the Committee, a pilot local industrial health survey is being carried out at Halifax, and a second pilot health survey is now being planned.

Dr. Stross: Whilst thanking the Parliamentary Secretary for his reply, may I ask whether he can state what it is envisaged will be done to bring in the general medical practitioner in the areas so that he can play his part?

Mr. Watkinson: The hon. Gentleman knows the composition of this Committee, which is a wide one. In these pilot surveys we hope to explore the kind of thing which he has suggested, and that will probably be done in Halifax and in the other centres.

Mr. Gibson: May I ask the Minister whether in these pilot surveys special attention is being given to the dangers of dermatitis in the wood machinery industry, where at the moment it seems to be prevalent.

Mr. Watkinson: I said that dermatitis is one of the special problems which the Committee is looking at, and I will make a note to ensure that we do not miss it in these pilot surveys.

Cotton Industry

Mr. H. Wilson: asked the Minister of Labour the net number by which employment in the cotton industry has fallen over the last year and the last four years, taking the latest month for which figures are available.

Mr. Watkinson: In the 12 months to the end of September, 1955, there was a fall of 29,000 and in the four years to the same date a fall of 60,000.

Mr. Wilson: In view of these alarming figures, has the hon. Gentleman made

any calculation as to how many more years of this Government will be needed for the cotton industry to die out altogether in this country?

Mr. Watkinson: If I may say so, that is the kind of supplementary question which does not help anybody, much less the cotton industry. I am trying to give the facts. I agree with the right hon. Gentleman that it is right that the industry and the country should know them, but another fact, which is at least of some consolation, is that my Ministry has found a job in some other industry for practically every man and woman who has been displaced from the cotton industry.

Mr. Nabarro: Is it not a fact that any fall in employment in the cotton industry has been more than counterbalanced by increased employment in those industries making man-made fibres? In addition, is it not a fact that any unemployment in the cotton industry has been immediately absorbed in other industries in Lancashire?

Hon. Members: No.

Mr. Watkinson: The fact with which I am concerned is the employment position. As I have said, we are very glad, and I am sure the right hon. Gentleman is, that so far every man and woman displaced from the cotton industry who wants another job we have been able to place in some other industry in Lancashire.

Mr. J. T. Price: Can the Parliamentary Secretary give any idea of the number of native Lancashire workers who have been forced to emigrate to other industries in the Midlands and other parts of the country? Is he aware that in such migration the position of middle-aged people in their fifties and sixties, whose lives have been invested in the native industry of Lancashire, is not an easy one to solve and cannot be dealt with purely as a matter of statistics?

Mr. Watkinson: I quite agree. I cannot answer that question without notice, however, and if the hon. Member puts it down I will do my best to answer it.

Mr. H. Wilson: Do the Parliamentary Secretary's two supplementary answers and the question by the hon. Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Nabarro) mean that the only policy that the Government now


have for the cotton industry is to stand aside and see it decline so long as they can find work for the displaced workers in other industries?

Mr. Watkinson: The question of policy for the cotton industry is not for me but for my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade. I have given the information asked for by the right hon. Member as to the present unemployment position.

Engineering Apprentices, Merseyside

Mr. H. Wilson: asked the Minister of Labour how many school-leavers registering at Merseyside employment exchanges for work as apprentices in the engineering industry have been unable to be placed by his Department.

Mr. Watkinson: Seventy, Sir, of whom forty-five are doing other work while waiting for vacancies. Sixteen out of the total are under submission for suitable vacancies.

Mr. Wilson: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that in Merseyside, where there is a growing shortage of skilled labour of various kinds, his own Department has had to confirm that not enough vacancies are being created by employers for these apprentices? The unions in the area are extremely concerned. Will the Parliamentary Secretary do his best with the employers to bring to their attention that it is an extremely shortsighted policy not to be taking on more apprentices at this time?

Mr. Watkinson: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for raising this matter. I did not realise that so many boys could not get placed in craft apprenticeship, and I will certainly look into the matter.

Coal Mining Industry (Foreign Workers)

Mr. Iremonger: asked the Minister of Labour what steps he proposes to take to allow foreign miners to help solve the problems of the coal industry.

Captain Pilkington: asked the Minister of labour what arrangements exist for recruiting Europeans in order to produce more coal from British mines.

Mr. Watkinson: My Department has standing arrangements for bulk recruitment of foreign workers which could be

applied to the coal mining industry. I regret, however, that the National Coal Board has not been able to take advantage of these arrangements in the absence of agreement of the National Union of Mineworkers.

Mr. Iremonger: Is my hon. Friend aware of the grave widespread public dismay at what appears to the public, rightly or wrongly, to be a dog-in-the-manger attitude on the part of certain sections of the coal industry; and will he do his best to see that the considerations that weigh with the National Coal Board are given wide publicity? Will he, further, try to bring home to those concerned their share of responsibility for the national economy?

Mr. Watkinson: The position is, as I think my hon. Friend knows, that the Executive of the National Union of Mineworkers has deferred a decision on the recruitment of foreign workers until a detailed examination has been made into the labour force in the pits. Until that examination has been completed and a decision reached between the Coal Board and the National Union of Mineworkers, I am afraid that my Ministry's services, although available, cannot be made use of.

Captain Pilkington: Does my hon. Friend not think that when it is understood by the miners that the importation of some of this Continental labour will help the country as a whole, they will surely agree to it?

Mr. Watkinson: I hope that that will result from the inquiry that is now taking place.

Mr. T. Williams: Will the Parliamentary Secretary be good enough to invite the hon. Member for Ilford, North (Mr. Iremonger) to do a bit of advertising for miners in his Ilford Parliamentary constituency?

Automation and Technological Developments

Mr. Beswick: asked the Minister of Labour if he is aware that a Joint Congressional Committee in the United States of America has been directed to study the effects of automation and technological developments on the financial structure of industry and labour requirements; and if he will consider directing


a similar study by an appropriate body in this country.

Mr. Watkinson: I am aware of the inquiry referred to in the first part of the Question. As to the second part, I would refer the hon. Member to the reply given to the hon. Member for Salford, East (Mr. Allaun) on 7th July last.

Mr. Beswick: Since I did not have the opportunity of seeing that reply, would the hon. Gentleman say whether he is of opinion that sufficient inquiry is being made into this matter?

Mr. Watkinson: Yes, Sir. Perhaps I may add that what was then said was that the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research is carrying out a special study into the problems of automation; that is, on the technical side. On the side of the general attitude of employers and trade unions towards it, it seems to us at the moment that through the normal action in industry the question is solving itself quite satisfactorily.

Mr. Beswick: Does the hon. Gentleman not think that those inquiries are directed into too narrow a field, dealing more with the effect on the individual worker and with the technical matters involved? These studies concern more the whole aspect of the financial structure of the country. Is the Parliamentary Secretary satisfied that that aspect of affairs is being inquired into?

Mr. Watkinson: A very proper place to discuss that, if any interested party wants to raise it, is in the National Joint Advisory Council.

Radioactive Substances (Health Precautions)

Dr. Stross: asked the Minister of Labour what regulations are in force, designed to protect workers in factories and workshops against danger arising from the use of radioactive materials.

Mr. Watkinson: The Factories (Luminising) Special Regulations, 1947, prescribe the health precautions to be taken in factories using luminous materials containing a radioactive substance. Draft special Regulations for factories using radioactive substances for other purposes are in course of preparation.

Dr. Stross: Will the Parliamentary Secretary bear in mind that both at the

point of manufacture and in their distribution a very special technique has been evolved in handling these materials? Will he assure us that the Inspectorate will be made completely conversant with all these matters so that the Regulations will take note of them?

Mr. Watkinson: I do not know whether the hon. Member has read our latest booklet on precautions in the use of ionising radiations. If not, I will send him a copy.

COST OF LIVING

Mr. Dodds: asked the Minister of Labour if he is aware that in September the price of eggs, bacon, coal, coke, cheese, sugar, sausages, tinned meats, lettuces and runner beans rose, but that the decrease in the price of potatoes and cooking apples still resulted in a fall in the cost-of-living index figure by one point to 149; and whether he will reconstruct the cost-of-living index in order to take the increased prices more fully into account.

Mr. Watkinson: The hon. Member's Question mentions September but it presumably relates to the fall of one point in the Retail Prices Index for August. In addition to substantial reductions in the prices of potatoes and cooking apples, there were also reductions in the prices of tomatoes, cabbage, other green vegetables and butter, and these reductions outweighed the price increases referred to by the hon. Member, causing the Index to fall one point. In September, on the other hand, the price increases reported outweighed the price decreases and the Index rose by one point. I am satisfied that the increased prices have been taken fully into account in computing the Index figures.

Mr. Dodds: In view of what lies ahead as the result of the disgraceful Budget, I apologise to the Minister for bothering him about a mere one-point difference in the cost of living.

Oral Answers to Questions — NATIONAL SERVICE

Personal Case

Mr. Dodds: asked the Minister of Labour if he can yet make a statement explaining why Mr. Roy Robert Houghton


was detailed to the Army despite an accident in which he sustained three fractures of the right ankle, necessitating the fixture of a screw to hold the ankle bone together, causing a permanent disability with pain and swelling from undue pressure on his right foot.

Mr. Watkinson: The medical assessment of this young man took into account the physical condition and functional capacity of his right ankle. Because of the fractures he was placed in medical grade II (a) feet. He first expressed a preference for the Royal Navy and later volunteered for Regular engagement in the Army. Perhaps for this reason he did not exercise is right of appeal against the decision of the medical board and he was then correctly called up for restricted service. I understand that at the request of the hon. Member the Army is looking into the case of this man again, and I note that the hon. Member has put a Question down to the Secretary of State for War.

Mr. Dodds: Is the Parliamentary Secretary not surprised to know that this young man, who was sent into the Army by the Parliamentary Secretary's Department, has been excused almost every duty expected of a soldier, wears canvas shoes and at present is home on sick leave? When will the hon. Gentleman stop defending this farce of sending into the Forces young men who ought never to be in the Forces?

Mr. Watkinson: What I hope that the hon. Member for Erith and Crayford (Mr. Dodds) and, indeed, any other hon. Member will do, is to remind more young men who go for National Service that if they are not satisfied with the decision of the medical board, they are clearly informed in writing that they have a constitutional right to appeal to my Ministry against the gradings. If more young men would do that, these cases would not arise.

Mr. Woodburn: I have sent a case to the Parliamentary Secretary. Does he not agree that if it is Government policy to reduce the Armed Forces, a beginning might be made by not taking into the Army people of obviously inferior qualifications and partly-crippled people? Is it not a waste of Government money to take them into the Army?

Mr. Watkinson: That does not arise from this case.

Mr. Dodds: Owing to the very unsatisfactory answer, I beg to give notice that I shall raise the matter on the Adjournment.

Oral Answers to Questions — SCOTLAND

Herring Industry Board's Report

Sir R. Boothby: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he has now received a Report from the Herring Industry Board on the working of the present share system in the herring fishing industry, the question of prices, and the financial structure of the industry as a whole, with particular reference to the burden of debt; what specific recommendations it contains; and what action he proposes to take.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. J. Henderson Stewart): Yes, Sir, my right hon. Friend has received a Report from the Board of which I am sending my hon. Friend a copy. Further copies are available in the Vote Office. The Report concludes that the share system is sufficiently flexible to meet changing conditions, that there is no reason to suppose that the catcher is not getting his fair share of the price the consumer is willing to pay and that the general burden of debt is not unduly severe. It contains no specific recommendations but the Board will, with the co-operation of Government Departments, continue its efforts to promote the prosperity of the industry.

Sir R. Boothby: Will copies of the Report be available in the Vote Office tonight?

Mr. Stewart: Yes Sir.

Sir R. Boothby: I thank my hon. Friend very much.

Highlands and Islands (Special Authority)

Mr. Hector Hughes: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland what representations he has received, and from whom, proposing that he should establish one or more Scottish regional authorities operating with Government funds to co-ordinate development plans for Scotland and to seek a solution for unemployment in Scotland.

Mr. Henderson Stewart: My right hon. Friend has received representations from Sutherland County Council, the Scottish Trades Union Congress and the local authorities' Hydro-Electric General Committee in favour of setting up a special authority with powers to plan the rehabilitation of the Highlands and Islands. This proposal was considered and rejected by the Royal Commission on Scottish Affairs.

Mr. Hughes: Does the Joint Under-Secretary realise the importance of coordinating and publicising such plans? Has the Secretary of State any such plans of his own? Will he publish a White Paper on the present situation, having regard to its importance to industry in Scotland?

Mr. Stewart: As the hon. and learned Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hector Hughes) knows, there is now a large measure of co-ordination and there have been one or two White Papers on the matter. However, if he would like me to write to him more fully, I shall be happy so to do.

Fireworks (Period of Sale)

Mr. G. M. Thomson: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will promote legislation to prohibit the sale of explosive fireworks in Scotland except on a restricted number of days immediately preceding 5th November.

Mr. Henderson Stewart: My right hon. and gallant Friend the Home Secretary and my right hon. Friend do not consider, having regard to the powers already available for controlling the use of fireworks, that new legislation of the kind suggested would be justified.

Mr. Thomson: Has the Under-Secretary ever tried nursing a baby to sleep amid all the thunderflashes that have been going off during the whole of the last six weeks? Will he at least have a word with the police about restricting these things, without spoiling anybody's fun?

Mr. Stewart: Under the present law steps can be taken when people are being obstreperous and a bit of a nuisance in the street, and, that being so, we do not feel that further steps are necessary.

Land Acquisition and Disposal

Captain Duncan: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he is aware that the basis of compensation for compulsory acquisition of land by local authorities is the existing use value plus so much of any unexpended balance of established development value as is appropriate to the interest being acquired whereas disposals of land by local authorities to private persons are on the basis of current market value; and, in view of the unfairness of this, what steps he will take to amend the law on this subject.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. J. Nixon Browne): The basis of compensation to which the hon. Member refers was laid down in the Town and Country Planning (Scotland)Act, 1954, which came into operation as recently as 1st January, 1955, and it is too early to consider any change. Local authorities in Scotland do not normally use their compulsory purchase powers to buy more land than they need. When exceptionally they dispose of surplus land which may well have changed its character during their ownership they are required to get the best price they can. I see nothing unfair in this requirement.

Captain Duncan: Is my hon. Friend not aware that as a result of inquiries under the development plans of local towns, this real grievance has come to light? Will he not now set up a committee to collect evidence so that legislation, if necessary, may be introduced at a later date?

Mr. Browne: I am not fully aware of the point which my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for South Angus (Captain Duncan) has in mind, but if he will send me any particulars, I shall be very glad to look into them.

Captain Duncan: As my hon. Friend is not fully aware of the circumstances, I beg to give notice that I shall raise the matter on the Adjournment.

Surgical Beds, West Fife

Mr. Hamilton: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland what has been the increase in the provision of surgical beds in the Dunfermline and West Fife Hospital since 1948.

Mr. J. N. Browne: There are ninety-one surgical beds. There has been


no change in this number since 1948, but a casualty block of twenty beds is in the course of construction.

Mr. Hamilton: Is the Joint Under-Secretary aware that the general hospital accommodation position in West Fife is thoroughly unsatisfactory? Is he aware that a simple hernia case in West Fife has, on occasion, to wait as long as three years, and that in the meantime further complications may well develop? Would he have a look at the whole position in West Fife with a view to giving us much more capital expenditure on hospital accommodation in what is, after all, one of the developing mining areas in which hon. Members opposite are so impatient to see progress made?

Mr. Browne: The hon. Member for Fife, West (Mr. Hamilton) will appreciate that the surgical facilities in the area have been considerably extended, with the greater use of the Bridge of Farn hospital for West Fife patients, that a considerable number of patients from Dunfermline are treated in the Edinburgh hospitals and the position will get better when the new block, which should be ready for use before the end of 1957, is completed.

Town Development (Legislation)

Mr. McInnes: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland what representations he has received from Scottish local authorities in favour of the introduction of a Town Development Act in Scotland.

Mr. J. N. Browne: None, Sir. But my right hon. Friend has suggested to Glasgow Corporation and the Clyde Valley Planning Advisory Committee that such legislation is essential to assist in solving the city's overspill problem. Discussions are proceeding with the local authorities who might be willing to take overspill; and the Committee has undertaken to furnish its views on the lines the legislation might take.

Mr. McInnes: As Glasgow is the only town in Scotland with an overspill problem, does the Under-Secretary consider it necessary to introduce legislation for one town? If he does consider it necessary, will he give us an assurance that subventions under the Town Development Act will not be drastically reduced or abolished, as in the case of housing subsidies?

Mr. Browne: The hon. Member for Glasgow, Central (Mr. McInnes) will understand that even for Glasgow town development is not possible without legislation. Without it no grant can be made to an importing local authority for sewerage; local authorities cannot make contributions one to another and one local authority cannot act as agent for another. So legislation in some form is essential. In reply to the second part of the hon. Member's question, in the forthcoming subsidy review the special needs of overspill and transferred industrial population, like those in England, will be taken into account.

Mrs. Mann: Will the hon. Gentleman take into consideration that although Glasgow is only one local authority, it is the one exporting authority, and that the receiving authorities will require a "sweetener" in order to receive? Will he see that adequate compensation is made? No matter what the name of the Act or Bill, will he see that they are adequately compensated?

Mr. Browne: That is one point which will be taken into account.

Cumbernauld (Industrial Development)

Mr. McInnes: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland (1) since the proposed new town at Cumbernauld is in the Development Area, how far arrangements are being made for the Scottish Industrial Estates Company to build factories concurrent with the building of houses by the development corporation;
(2) what proposals he has for the setting up of new industries at the proposed new town of Cumbernauld and also for the transference of existing industries from Glasgow to the new town.

Mr. J. N. Browne: The question of industrial development at Cumbernauld cannot be considered until my right hon. Friend reaches a final decision on the draft Designation Order for the proposed new town. This Order was the subject of a public local inquiry on 10th October, and my right hon. Friend hopes to be able to announce his decision soon.
I am sending the hon. Member a copy of the memorandum which was published


along with the draft Order and which deals, in paragraph 22, with the industrial prospects of the proposed new town.

Mr. McInnes: I take it that the hon. Gentleman is aware how essential it is that industries should be established current with the building of houses in the new towns?

Mr. Browne: Yes, Sir.

Mr. Woodburn: Will the hon. Gentleman and his right hon. Friend take into account the great concern in Scotland that there has been almost a cessation of "prior factory building" before occupation? In London, where during the period of office of the Labour Government there was a prohibition on industrial expansion under the town and country planning provisions, we find the position now reversed. Is the hon. Gentleman aware that we see industrial planning and development going on in London, which is already over-populated, and a cessation of such development in Scotland, and that we are concerned about this trend?

Mr. Browne: The answer, and it is a very important point, is that Cumbernauld is in the Development Area, and it would be possible for the Board of Trade, under the Distribution of Industry Act, to arrange for the Scottish Industrial Estates Company to build factories for approved industrial projects. The Board's New Town Development Corporation, as and when set up, will, it is hoped, assist in securing the transfer of industry from Glasgow. The point about this question is that such action must await the approval of the plan for the development of the new town.

Public Works Loan Board (Interest Rates)

Mr. Hoy: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland what local authorities have protested to him against the rises in interest rates on money borrowed from the Public Works Loan Board.

Mr. J. N. Browne: During this year protests have been received from twenty-eight local authorities, whose names I am circulating in the OFFICIAL REPORT. A protest was also received from the Ayrshire Burghs Association.

Mr. Hoy: May we have an assurance that these protests will be given real

attention, and that the Secretary of State will not be bound by the decisions announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Minister of Housing and Local Government in England?

Mr. Browne: These protests are from 28 out of about 430 local authorities, but the Secretary of State will give full weight to them.

Following are the names:


County councils—


Ayr.
Midlothian


Fife.



Town councils—


Ardrossan.
Kilwinning


Auchtermuchty
Kirkcaldy.


Ayr.
Leslie.


Buckie.
Lochgelly.


Burntisland.
Montrose.


Cowdenheath.
Musselburgh.


Dunfermline.
Newmilns.


Galston.
Pittenweem.


Glasgow.
Renfrew.


Greenock.
St. Monance.


Inverkeithing
Saltcoats.


Kilsyth.
Stevenston.


District councils—


Fifth District Council of Ayr.

Local Government Finance (Review)

Mr. Hannan: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he will undertake a full review of all aspects of local government finance as part of the problem of local government reform and reorganisation similar to the review which is to be undertaken in England and Wales.

Mr. J. N. Browne: The review of local government finance which the Government have decided to undertake will cover Scotland as well as England and Wales.

Mr. Hannan: May I ask the hon. Gentleman whether, when the Minister of Housing and Local Government made this statement on 30th June, it was then intended to cover Scotland? If so, why was there not a separate statement for Scotland; or could the hon. Gentleman give the date subsequent to 30th June when Scotland was informed of such a review?

Mr. Browne: The statement made by the Minister covered Scotland. The Secretary of State's Department is taking


part in the preliminary study of the problems involved. Talks will take place in due course with the local authorities' associations. These discussions will extend to the Scottish associations. The review of local government finance is not associated in Scotland with the reform of local government organisation.

Electricity Boards (Reduction of Expenditure)

Mr. Nabarro: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland what contribution is to be made, respectively, by the North of Scotland Hydro-Electric Board and the South of Scotland Electricity Board, to the policy of Her Majesty's Government in economising inessential expenditure and reducing capital investment programmes in the nationalised industries.

Mr. Henderson Stewart: This matter is still under discussion with the two boards.

Mr. Nabarro: Yes, Sir, but it is three months ago that I first asked about this matter. Can my hon. Friend assure the House that these Scottish nationalised boards are not going to be sancrosanct in the matter of conforming with the Government's revised economic and financial policy?

Mr. Stewart: I have no doubt that the Scottish boards will play their proper part in this national emergency.

Mr. Nabarro: But how soon can we have a statement?

Mr. Woodburn: Will the hon. Gentleman keep in mind the very important factor that in many areas in Scotland where the Hydro-Electric Board is working there is no alternative employment, and that it is not true economy to stop work there and throw thousands of people on to the unemployment registers?

Mr. Stewart: That is one of the many peculiar considerations that we have to bear in mind.

Mr. Nabarro: How soon can we have a statement?

Mr. Stewart: If the hon. Gentleman cares to put down a Question to me next week or the week after, or even the week after that, I shall be very pleased to answer it.

Mr. Nabarro: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland what economies he has arranged in the promotional advertising expenditure of the North of Scotland Hydro-Electric Board and the South of Scotland Electricity Board consonant with the policy of Her Majesty's Government in reducing expenditure of an inessential character by nationalised industries, and the reduction of £500,000 per annum in the promotional expenditure of the gas and electricity boards south of the Border.

Mr. Henderson Stewart: For the current financial year the North of Scotland Hydro-Electric Board and the South of Scotland Electricity Board are reducing their expenditure on advertising by about 33⅓ per cent.

Mr. Nabarro: Will my hon. Friend bear in mind that his reply is totally inadequate, and that there is no alternative source of electricity supply in the area of the North of Scotland Board? Why should a State monopoly—

Mr. Emrys Hughes: Guinness.

Mr. Nabarro: Guinness is not a State monopoly—find it necessary to spend the consumers' money on promotional advertising?

Sir R. Boothby: Is my hon. Friend aware that the Hydro-Electric Board has brought immense benefits to the people of this area, and that, as against Kidderminster, nothing but admiration and gratitude is felt for the expedition and efficiency with which the board has discharged its duties?

Dr. Stross: Will the hon. Gentleman also bear in mind—and perhaps remind his hon. Friend the Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Nabarro) of this—that hydro-electric boards generate electricity without atmospheric pollution, and should therefore be given the highest priority?

Mr. Nabarro: May I have an answer to my supplementary question, Mr. Speaker?

Mr. Speaker: I have not seen any signs of an answer to that, but perhaps the hon. Gentleman may have better luck with Question No. 28.

Tummel Valley Scheme (Cost)

Mr. Nabarro: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland the cost, per kilowatt installed, £/kwI., of the Constructional


Scheme No. 31, Tummel Valley (Additions Project), as set out in Statutory Instrument, 1955, No. 1469; and how such a scheme compares in capital cost with standard oil-fired generators of equivalent capacity at today's average price of approximately £60 per kilowatt installed.

Mr. Henderson Stewart: This scheme provides for 3,900 kilowatts of new plant and will enable 8,000 kilowatts of existing plant, at present idle, to be used. The estimated cost of the 11,900 kilowatts is £113 per kilowatt.
The estimated cost per unit of the 32·7 million units to be produced from the scheme is 0·53d., which is less than the cost of producing the electricity by any other means and about one-third of the average cost of generating from oil in the North of Scotland district.

Mr. Nabarro: Is it not a fact that this scheme was produced and put on to paper before the Government's plans for the amendment of capital investment were announced? As the capital investment cost of this scheme is markedly higher than that of alternative methods, cannot the scheme be reviewed before it is commenced?

Cancer Cases (Hospital Statistics)

Mr. Hannan: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he is satisfied that the system of hospital statistics in each of the regions for which he is responsible now provide complete information of the incidents of cases of cancer which come under their care, and that the follow-up of the results, for research purposes, is becoming more effective.

Mr. J. N. Browne: The completeness of the regional records is steadily improving, as also is the effectiveness of follow-up. In two of the regions the information is already sufficiently complete to enable some preliminary findings to be drawn from them, and I am sending to the hon. Member a copy of an article that has been published showing the kind of information that is becoming available.

Mr. Hannan: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the information he has given today differs in no degree whatever from that given in the 1953 Report of the Department of Health? In view of the importance of this matter, will he impress

on all those concerned with this business the necessity to see that all regions are covered in this respect?

Mr. Browne: Yes, Sir.

Crofters' Holdings, Balmartin

Mr. Malcolm MacMillan: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland what steps he has taken to draw the attention of the Crofters Commission to the request of the crofters at Balmartin, Isle of North Uist, to have their holdings extended; and whether he will press for a speedy decision in view of the fact that several years have passed since their request was first submitted to him.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Niall Macpherson): My right hon. Friend will draw the attention of the Crofters Commission to this request but he feels he must leave it to the Commission to judge in what order it should tackle the many problems which are before it.

Mr. MacMillan: Is the hon. Gentleman aware—I do not blame him personally—that for the last four years the Secretary of State has completely ignored the situation here while one after another of the crofters are leaving? One has emigrated this week, and another has died leaving a widow and seven children to manage an unproductive patch of ground, while the Secretary of State stands up for absentee landlords without any consideration for the people and their feelings?

Mr. Macpherson: My right hon. Friend told the hon. Gentleman three years ago that he was awaiting the appointment of the Crofters Commission. The Commission has now been set up.

Mr. MacMillan: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the Secretary of State has full power to tackle this problem by legislation already on the Statute Book, and has done nothing at all about it? Will he please reconsider pressing this matter with the Crofters Commission as one of real urgency?

Mr. Macpherson: I am aware that my right hon. Friend has full powers, but the Taylor Commission recommended that those powers should be used in accordance with the advice of the Crofters Commission.

Guided Missile Range Scheme, Outer Hebrides

Mr. Malcolm MacMillan: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland from whom, apart from the hon. Member for the Western Isles, he has received representations regarding the proposal to establish a guided missile range and ancillary installations in the Outer Hebrides; and which of those representations have been in favour of the project.

Mr. J. N. Browne: My right hon. Friend has received in all some thirty-five communications mainly from private individuals. Broadly these consist either of representations against the proposal to establish the range or of requests for further information.

Mr. MacMillan: Will the hon. Gentleman convey to his right hon. Friend that the two main considerations that are worrying the local people—as distinct from all the people who speak from outside without much authority—are, first, the fear that there may be a large influx of people, which may cause a serious alteration in the whole social and cultural life of the island, and, secondly, that there may be a disturbance of crofters in respect of their land and their homes; and, further, that other considerations are relatively unimportant compared with these two?

Mr. Browne: As soon as the Government are able to formulate specific proposals there will be full consultation with all the interests concerned and the fullest opportunity for the lodging and consideration of objections.

Mr. Woodburn: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that, in addition to the circumstances outlined by my hon. Friend, there has been a great deal of correspondence and agitation in Scotland on this matter which seems to have arisen from the fact that no proper explanation has been given of the circumstances and the need for this range? Will the hon. Gentleman advise his right hon. Friend and his colleagues in the War Office that there ought to be given to the public proper information on the subject which, if it proves that the range is absolutely necessary, might remove a great deal of opposition to it?

Mr. Browne: That will be done as soon as specific proposals are formulated.

Road, Barra (Construction)

Mr. Malcolm MacMillan: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland when work on the construction of the Eoligarry Strand Road in the Isle of Barra is to begin.

Mr. N. Macpherson: I am unable to say when the construction of this road will begin. It involves an existing classified road and has therefore been under consideration by the Ministry of Transport. I understand that it is unlikely that the Ministry will be able to authorise this work during the current year.

Mr. MacMillan: Is the Minister aware that this road is the first major reconstruction priority of the Inverness County Council? Is he further aware that it has been ready to start for goodness knows how many years, and that very recently only a question of a small technical adjustment between the Ministry of Transport and the Department of Agriculture was involved? Why has the work been set back now?

Mr. Macpherson: I cannot add to what I have already answered. This matter will come up for consideration again when my right hon. Friend takes over control of roads in Scotland next April.

Roads and Piers Programme, Crofting Counties

Mr. Grimond: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will give an assurance that the programme of roads and piers in the crofting counties will be maintained in full.

Mr. Henderson Stewart: As regards the programme of roads in the crofting counties, I would refer the hon. Member to the reference to the roads programme made by my right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in his statement on 26th October.
As regards piers, works in progress will continue, and new schemes which are urgently necessary to meet the needs of the area will be considered as they arise in the light of my right hon. Friend's statement.

Mr. Grimond: I hope that when these new schemes are considered the great need for piers will be kept very much in mind. As to roads, may I ask the Minister categorically to confirm not only


that the schemes already approved will go forward, but that the amounts of money announced by the previous Government and by this Government as being available for Highland development are still available, and will be expended upon roads within the period already suggested?

Mr. Stewart: As the hon. Member knows, what the Chancellor said was this:
My right hon. Friend the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation is going ahead with the roads programme which has been announced. …"—[OFFICIAL, REPORT, 26th October, 1955; Vol. 545, c. 218.]
As I understand it, the hon. Member was talking about what had been announced in one form or another. Therefore, I think he can take it that there will be no change.

Oral Answers to Questions — EDUCATION, SCOTLAND

Teachers (Equal Pay)

Sir T. Moore: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland his plans to deal with the conflicting demands of the teachers, male and female, in respect of equal pay in the profession.

Mr. Henderson Stewart: I have no evidence that there is any conflict between women teachers and the great majority of men teachers on the subject of equal pay in the teaching profession, but I hope to be able to refer to this matter in the course of the debate today.

Sir T. Moore: While thanking my hon. Friend for his conciliatory reply, may I ask whether he will appreciate that it is rather disturbing for Scottish Members to receive constant demands from the female teachers for equality and constant demands from the male teachers for inequality? In his speech later today, will he refer to how we are to answer these somewhat conflicting groups?

Mr. Stewart: I shall try to do my best.

Superannuated Teachers (Earnings)

Mr. Rankin: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland if, in order to help in overcoming the shortage of teachers, he will consider the advisability of allowing those retired teachers who are prepared

to return to teaching to draw the pension they have earned in addition to the salary to which they would be entitled.

Mr. Henderson Stewart: This is one of a number of proposals made by the Educational Institute of Scotland which are being discussed with the Institute in connection with the proposed revision of the teachers' superannuation scheme.

Mr. Rankin: Cannot the Minister do something? Would not he agree that this practice is a complete anomaly, and that if a person has earned a right to a pension, he should be allowed to enjoy it irrrespective of the employment in which he is engaged?

Mr. Stewart: I am aware of that argument, the strength of which I recognise. I am hoping to meet the Educational Institute of Scotland, and no doubt that side of the argument will be presented.

Mr. Rankin: Is it the case that the Treasury are the real opponent of this really necessary reform, and what is the hon. Gentleman doing to try to convert them?

Mr. Stewart: The hon. Member cannot expect me to answer for the Treasury.

Mr. Rankin: What is the hon. Member there for?

Teachers' Superannuation Account (Credit Balance)

Mr. Hannan: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland the estimated credit balance in the Teachers' Superannuation Account (Scotland) at 31st March for each of the years 1954 and 1955.

Mr. Henderson Stewart: The estimated credit balances are £37,120,000 and £39,260,000.

Mr. Hannan: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that this credit balance is now 50 per cent. greater than that stated in the Actuary's Report for 1948, and in view of the consternation in the ranks of teachers that although there is a balance here there is yet a deficiency in the fund, will the hon. Gentleman take steps at an early date—even today—to give an explanation of why these contrary terms are used?

Mr. Stewart: Yes, I will do that as soon as I get an opportunity.

Oral Answers to Questions — HOUSING, SCOTLAND

Local Authority Houses (Interest Rates)

Mr. Hoy: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland if he is aware that the Government's action in raising the loan charges on local authority houses from 3¾ per cent. to 5 per cent, has increased the ultimate cost of each £1,500 house by £963; and what action he proposes taking to relieve councils and tenants of this debt burden.

Mr. J. N. Browne: I would refer the hon. Member to the statement which my right hon. Friend made to the House on 27th October, when he said that he proposed to put in hand a comprehensive review of the housing subsidies in consultation with the local authority associations. This will take account of all relevant factors.

Mr. Hoy: It will be noticed that the Minister does not deny the facts given in these Questions; and as these terrific increases in the debt burden are the outcome of the Government's action in increasing the interest rate, what hope can he offer to local authorities and tenants of relief from this appalling debt burden which the Government have placed on their shoulders?

Mr. Browne: When the present subsidies were fixed in 1952 the rate of interest was 4¼ per cent. When it subsequently fell to 3¾ per cent. no change was made in Scottish subsidies. The local authorities cannot always hope to have it both ways. Subsidies have necessarily to be fixed on a long-term basis and cannot be altered with every change in the rate of interest.

Mr. Hoy: On the other hand, the Minister is bound to realise that no Government, except this one, has increased the rates four times in eight months, and how can any local authority carry on a housing programme when the Government have changed the interest rates in an upward direction so frequently as this Government have done?

Mr. Browne: The answer is that the investigations referred to by my right hon. Friend will take into account all the relevant factors, and I am sure that the associations will not fail to draw to his notice the point made by the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: But when the hon. Gentleman's right hon. Friend meets the local authorities, will he be open to be influenced or persuaded by them, or will he lay down the law to them?

Mr. Browne: My right hon. Friend never meets the authorities without listening to them with great care and taking note of everything that they say.

Mr. Hoy: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland if he is aware that interest charges on each house built by the new town development corporations costing £1,650 have been increased by £17 13s. per annum, equal to an increase in rent of 7s. 6d. per week, as a result of the Government's action in raising the interest charges from 3¾ per cent. to 5 per cent.; and what action he intends taking to reduce this increase in the cost of living to the tenants.

Mr. J. N. Browne: The answer to the first part of the Question is, "Yes." As regards the second part of the Question, the levels of subsidies for houses in new towns in Scotland will be dealt with in the forthcoming review of Scottish housing subsidies.

Mr. Hoy: In the meantime, does the Minister think that the new town authorities have to go on increasing their debt burden, because of the changes in the interest rates, or must they pass on the total increase to the tenants? Is the Minister aware that if the rents are increased in this fashion, he will have great difficulty in attracting tenants to the new towns?

Mr. Browne: I have had no proposals from the corporations about increasing the rents, and I can assure the hon. Gentleman that at the forthcoming subsidy review the new towns in Scotland, like those in England, will benefit by any higher subsidies provided for overspill and the transfer of the industrial population.

Repairs (Rent Increases)

Mr. Rankin: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland in how many cases in Glasgow increases in rents in accordance with recent legislation have been refused.

Mr. J. N. Browne: Up to 30th June, 1955, thirteen applications by landlords in Glasgow for certificates of repair to


enable them to claim repairs increases in rents under the Housing (Repairs and Rents) (Scotland) Act, 1954, had been refused.
In addition, repairs increases in respect of 435 houses in Glasgow were suspended by the issue of certificates of disrepair. In 191 of these cases, however, the certificates were subsequently revoked on the landlord carrying out the necessary repairs.

Mr. Rankin: Is the Minister aware that these figures are no indication of the vast number of cases in which the landlords have not even attempted to put into operation the provisions of the Act, and does he realise that, at least in Glasgow, the Act is failing completely in its purpose?

Mr. Browne: The Act is only in its first year of operation, and, as yet, it is too early to say how effective it will be. There are many properties in Glasgow in regard to which the Act has been and can be effective, but I appreciate that in the hon. Gentleman's constituency there are many bad properties where these provisions of the Act can never apply, and for which the only solution is to pull them down.

Subsidies

Mr. Emrys Hughes: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland if, in view of the need for local authorities to plan their long-term housing programme, he will consider stating the approximate date when he proposes to revise the housing subsidies.

Mr. J. N. Browne: My right hon. Friend proposes to open negotiations with the associations of local authorities shortly, but, as he indicated in the statement which he made to the House on 27th October, the legislation necessary to give effect to the revision of the subsidies will have to be deferred until after the Sorn legislation.

Mr. Hughes: Is the Minister aware of the great alarm and despondency which exists among local authorities in Scotland about the various announcements of Government housing policy? If there are to be negotiations, will they really be negotiations in which the local authorities' demand for a continuation of the subsidy and no halt in housing progress in Scotland will be listened to?

Mr. Browne: Of course my right hon. Friend will listen to the representations made by local authorities.

Oral Answers to Questions — MINISTRY OF WORKS

Admiralty Citadel

Mr. Tilney: asked the Minister of Works what plans he has in hand to improve the look of the Admiralty Citadel for those passing along the Mall or Horse Guards Parade.

The Minister of Works (Mr. Nigel Birch): As my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary announced in the debate on the Adjournment on 27th October, more Virginia creepers are to be planted, and the old gun emplacements will be removed.

Mr. Tilney: Everybody will be grateful for what the right hon. Gentleman has said, but will he consider a little more variety in plants than just Virginia creeper? As an experiment—so that the sides can be covered more quickly—will he endeavour to plant a few creepers on the roof?

Mr. Birch: It is a hideous building, but whether it would be improved very much by trying to make it like an old-world tea garden, I rather doubt.

Mr. Stokes: In view of the fact that the kind of bomb which is likely to hit the building is entirely different from the kind of bomb which it was designed to resist, will not the right hon. Gentleman look into the whole matter and perhaps chip bits off the structure so as to make it less unsightly?

Merchiston Castle, Edinburgh

Mr. Grimond: asked the Minister of Works if he will take steps to ensure the preservation and repair of Merchiston Castle, Edinburgh.

Mr. Birch: Responsibility for the preservation of this castle rests with Edinburgh Corporation, who are the owners. I am ready to consider any request for financial assistance or advice, and the corporation has been so informed.

Mr. Grimond: I agree that the initial responsibility rests upon the corporation, but is it not the case that the Government also have certain powers in regard to


buildings of national importance, and should be prepared to exercise them, if necessary, in this case?

Mr. Birch: I think that an application will be made for assistance from historic buildings funds. I should not like to anticipate what will happen as a result.

Hyde Park (Road Entrances and Exits)

Captain Pilkington: asked the Minister of Works to make a statement regarding improvements to the road entrances and exits of Hyde Park.

Mr. Birch: I have agreed to an experimental roundabout inside the Park near the Victoria Gate. There are proposals for the Albert Gate and for a re-arrangement of roads at Alexandra Gate which I am considering. The Park Lane scheme is still under examination.

Captain Pilkington: Is my right hon. Friend aware that his reply is satisfactory so far as it goes, because the present waste of time, petrol and temper in Hyde Park is really intolerable?

Mr. Birch: I realise that there are traffic difficulties. On the other hand, it is important to remember that the parks are things of beauty and not only potential traffic roundabouts.

Mr. Stokes: In view of what the Minister has just said about the parks being things of beauty—with which I entirely agree—will he give an assurance that before any messing around in Park Lane is done he will consider the alternative scheme which has been put forward, so that the alternative double carriageway up Park Lane can be constructed without any serious interruption of the internal park carriageway, which can be maintained immune?

Mr. Birch: The scheme and all the possible alternatives to it are receiving very careful consideration.

The Mall (Trees)

Mr. Parker: asked the Minister of Works when a start is to be made on the necessary thinning of trees in The Mall and Birdcage Walk.

Wing Commander Bullus: asked the Minister of Works if he will make a statement about his proposals for the treatment of trees in St. James's Park.

Mr. Birch: It is generally agreed that our object should be to get fine avenues of well-grown trees in The Mall. This is impossible with planes planted only 20 ft. apart. The trees will suffer permanent damage if they are cut back much longer. I propose, therefore, in accordance with the recommendations of my Advisory Committee on Forestry, to remove alternate trees from the inner row on each side of the road during the coming winter.

Wing Commander Bullus: Is my right hon. Friend aware that Londoners are very anxious to preserve as many of the trees as possible in their parks? Will he give an undertaking that he will not cut down any trees unless it is absolutely necessary, and then see if we can have others planted in their place?

Mr. Birch: We are in fact carrying out a big planting programme in the parks. The point about The Mall was that the trees were originally planted close together because they were small and, like any other avenue or wood, they have to be thinned in due course.

Hotels, London (Departmental Occupation)

Mr. K. Robinson: asked the Minister of Works how many buildings in London originally built as hotels are occupied by Government Departments; and the total number of rooms involved.

Mr. Birch: So far as I can ascertain there are twelve buildings in London formerly used as hotels which are now held wholly or partly by Government Departments. Of these, six are used as hostels or nurses homes. There are about 2,000 rooms.

Mr. Robinson: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the summer tourist season this year revealed a very serious shortage of rooms in London hotels—especially in the West End? Would it not be a more rapid and economic solution to this problem if he were to give up some of the buildings which he is occupying, rather than cause delay by building new hotels?

Mr. Birch: I believe that I should congratulate the hon. Member upon an auspicious family event. Apart from that, practically none of these buildings is on requisition. Many of the buildings


have been held for 25 years, and if I gave them up I should have to put up new buildings, which I am not very willing to do at the moment.

Orangery, Kensington Gardens

Mr. Royle: asked the Minister of Works if he will cause the Orangery, Kensington Palace, to be put to better use than at present for the benefit of visitors to Kensington Gardens.

Mr. Birch: I am considering this.

Mr. Royle: Does the Minister agree that it is unfortunate that this fine building is not being put to some use? Will he consider approaching the Arts Council to see whether it would be prepared to hold exhibitions of contemporary art there? I am sure that that would be appreciated at that end of the gardens.

Mr. Birch: I quite agree that better use can be made of this building. I am advised that it is not very suitable for picture exhibitions, owing to the shape of the panels and the absence of proper heating, but I have some ideas for its use which I should like to discuss with the hon. Member.

Atomic Energy (Civil Use)

Mr. Gresham Cooke: asked the Minister of Works whether he will make arrangements to publish the fullest possible figures indicating the economic basis upon which the Government's plan for building atomic power stations has been drawn up; and whether he will include in that information an estimate of the value of the plutonium which will be produced in the atomic reactors.

Mr. Birch: The hon. Member will find the information for which he asks in the White Paper "A Programme of Nuclear Power" (Cmd. 9389). Information on the value of plutonium from atomic reactors is contained in a paper read to the recent Geneva Conference on the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy on behalf of the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority. I have had a copy put in the Library.

Mr. Gresham Cooke: Is my right hon. Friend aware that at the British Association, Sir Robert Robinson said that the value of the plutonium to be produced

would be nil and that, therefore, the production of atomic energy would not be economic? Would my right hon. Friend refute that idea?

Mr. Birch: I think my hon. Friend will find that the paper to which I have drawn his attention is very interesting. In this paper it is concluded that the minimum price of plutonium over the next 20 or 25 years will not sink below several thousand £s per kilogramme.

Mr. Gresham Cooke: asked the Minister of Works the policy of Her Majesty's Government for the development of atomic energy for civil purposes in this country; and whether he will make a statement setting out precisely what scope there is and will be for private industry to participate in this field, and how far the development will be retained as a Government monopoly.

Mr. Birch: Research is the responsibility of the Atomic Energy Authority, under the general control of the Lord President. The Authority is not responsible, however, for the development of atomic energy for civil purposes beyond the stage of the design and trial of new forms of plant and equipment. Commercial development will therefore provide scope for the participation of private industry, or, in the case of the generation of electricity from nuclear power stations, for the electricity authorities and private industry working together.

PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES (BROADCAST DISCUSSIONS)

Sir R. Boothby: asked the Prime Minister whether he will give an assurance that information regarding projected Parliamentary business will be withheld by Her Majesty's Government from the British Broadcasting Corporation or the Independent Television Authority until it is announced to the House of Commons.

Mr. Edelman: asked the Prime Minister what arrangement exists to inform the British Broadcasting Corporation and the Independent Television Authority of the nature of Government business to be transacted in the House 14 days in advance in order that they may be


enabled to comply with the direction to refrain from canvassing such business in their broadcasts.

The Prime Minister (Sir Anthony Eden): As my predecessor in office told the House in February this year, in order that broadcast discussions and ex parte statements may be avoided immediately before a debate in Parliament, Her Majesty's Government are prepared to give what information they can if inquiries are made about the likelihood of a debate within a fortnight on any particular subject.

Sir R. Boothby: Does the Prime Minister's answer mean that he is prepared to give to the B.B.C. and the I.T.A. information which he is not prepared to give to the House?

The Prime Minister: It has long been the practice, and it is now open to any hon. Member, of course, to seek information about future debates. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] Of course, it is open to every one in this House, through the usual channels, to seek information, if he can get it, about future debates. It is equally in the power of those authorities, if they wish for information, to ask for it. In point of fact, from time to time they do so. There has been no case of information being volunteered to them.

Mr. Edelman: Would not the Prime Minister agree that all censorship is bad and that an unworkable censorship is the worst of all, since it brings the law into disrepute? In view of the fact that this direction was made behind the back of Parliament, and further that this is the first formal act of political censorship for more than a hundred years, will the Prime Minister not now annul this iniquitous direction?

The Prime Minister: I do not think I could accept the hon. Gentleman's somewhat extravagant statement in regard to this matter. If it is desired to have this matter discussed in the House, approaches can be made through the usual channels. It seems to me that we do not deal with the matter helpfully by using the language of hyperbole.

Mr. T. Williams: Is it not a fact that a hundred years ago there were no such things as the B.B.C. or television?

ROYAL MARRIAGES ACT, 1772

The following Question stood upon the Order Paper:

LIEUT.-COLONEL LIPTON: TO ask the Prime Minister whether he will introduce legislation to repeal or amend the Royal Marriages Act, 1772.

Mr. Mellish: On a point of order. I wish to seek your guidance and help, Mr. Speaker. On the Order Paper is Question No. 52, in the name of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Brixton (Lieut.-Colonel Lipton), who has deferred the Question on a couple of occasions. In view of the circumstances, could you not, in your capacity as Speaker, appeal to my hon. and gallant Friend to have the decency to withdraw this Question?

Mr. Speaker: My only real concern is whether the Question is in order or not. It is in order to put a Question down which asks for action, so the hon. and gallant Member's Question is down on the Order Paper.

Lieut.-Colonel Lipton: Do I understand you to say now, Mr. Speaker, that the Question is definitely in order?

The Prime Minister: I will, with permission, answer this Question.
I have had this possibility very much in mind. I should, however, warn the House that this Act is of concern, not to the United Kingdom alone, but to all the Commonwealth countries of which Her Majesty is Queen; and amending legislation could not be undertaken here without their concurrence.

Lieut.-Colonel Lipton: Have Her Majesty's Government therefore decided, after considering this Act of 1772 in the light of 1955, that it still provides a useful and necessary weapon of control which Her Majesty's Government at the moment are reluctant to abandon, no matter what personal ordeal is involved for anyone?

The Prime Minister: In view of the hon. and gallant Member's imputations—which I think they really are—about the Act, I ought to add that the advice of Her Majesty's Government has neither been sought nor given to the Queen during recent events.

Mr. J. T. Price: On a point of order. Irrespective of the merits of the Question


which the Prime Minister has just answered, may I ask, Mr. Speaker, on what grounds the Prime Minister decided to answer Question No. 52 and to by-pass the rest?

Mr. Speaker: It is entirely a matter for the Prime Minister. I suppose he thought the Question was of sufficient public interest, and he asked my permission to answer it before he did so.

The Prime Minister: It was a difficult decision to take. This Question has been on the Order Paper for a long time, and as there has been a good deal of speculation about it, and as it has not been withdrawn, I thought it better that it should be answered.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. We have finished with that Question now. There seems to be no Ministerial responsibility in that matter at all.

Oral Answers to Questions — BILL PRESENTED

HOUSING SUBSIDIES

Bill to make provision with respect to contributions in connection with housing accommodation, presented by Mr. Sandys; supported by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Mr. Deedes; read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Thursday and to be printed. [Bill 46.]

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Motion made, and Question put,
That the Proceedings on the Agriculture (Improvement of Roads) Bill be exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the provisions of Standing Order No. 1 (Sittings of the House)—[The Prime Minister]:—

The House divided: Ayes 225, Noes 175.

Division No. 33.]
AYES
[3.35 p.m.


Agnew, Cmdr. P. G.
D'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
Howard, John (Test)


Aitken, W. T.
Deedes, W. F.
Hudson, W. R. A. (Hull, N.)


Allan, R. A. (Paddington, S.)
Digby, S. Wingfield
Hughes Hallett, Vice-Admiral J.


Alport, C. J. M.
Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. McA.
Hughes-Young, M. H. C.


Amery, Julian (Preston, N.)
Duncan, Capt. J. A. L.
Hulbert, Sir Norman


Anstruther-Gray, Major W.J.
Duthie, W. S.
Hurd, A. R.


Armstrong, C. W.
Eden,Rt.Hn.SirA.(Warwick &amp; L'm'tn)
Hutchison, Sir Ian Clark (E'b'gh, W.)


Ashton, H.
Eden, J. B. (Bournemouth, West)
Hutchison, James (Scotstoun)


Astor, Hon. J. J.
Elliot, Rt. Hon. W. E.
Hyde, Montgomery


Atkins, H. E.
Errington, Sir Eric
Hylton-Foster, Sir H. B. H.


Baldwin, A. E.
Farey-Jones, F. W.
Iremonger, T. L.


Balniel, Lord
Fell, A.
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)


Banks, Col. C.
Fisher, Nigel
Jenkins, Robert (Dulwich)


Barber, Anthony
Fleetwood-Hesketh, R. F.
Jennings, J. C. (Burton)


Barlow, Sir John
Fraser, Hon. Hugh (Stone)
Jennings, Sir Roland (Hallam)


Barter, John
Fraser, Sir lan(M'cmbe &amp; Lonsdale)
Johnson, Dr. Donald (Carlisle)


Bell, Ronald (Bucks, S.)
Freeth, D. K.
Johnson, Eric (Blackley)


Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J.
Galbraith, Hon. T. G. D.
Jones, A. (Hall Green)


Bevlns, J. R. (Toxteth)
Garner-Evans, E. H.
Joynson-Hicks, Hon. L. W.


Bldgood, J. C.
George, J. C. (Pollok)
Kaberry, D.


Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel
Glover, D.
Keegan, D.


Bishop, F. P.
Godber, J. B.
Kerr, H. W.


Black, C. W.
Gomme-Duncan, Col. A.
Kershaw, J. A.


Boothby, Sir Robert
Gough, C. F. H.
Kirk, P. M.


Bowen, E. R. (Cardigan)
Gower, H. R.
Lagden, G. W.


Boyle, Sir Edward
Grant, W. (Woodside)
Lancaster, Col. C. G.


Braine, B. R.
Green, A.
Leather, E. H. C.


Brooke, Rt. Hon. Henry
Gresham Cooke, R.
Leavey, J. A.


Brooman-White, R. C.
Grimond, J.
Leburn, W. G.


Browne, J. Nixon (Craigton)
Grimston, Sir Robert (Westbury)
Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H.


Buchan-Henburn, Rt. Hon. P. G. T.
Grosvenor, Lt.-Col. R. G.
Legh, Hon. Peter (Petersfield)


Bullus, Wing Commander E. E.
Gurden, Harold
Lennox-Boyd, Rt. Hon. A. T.


Butcher, Sir Herbert
Hall, John (Wycombe)
Lindsay, Hon. James (Devon, N.)


Campbell, Sir David
Hare, Hon. J. H.
Lloyd, Maj. Sir Guy (Renfrew, E.)


Carr, Robert
Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N.W.)
Lloyd-George, Maj. Rt. Hon. G.


Cary, Sir Robert
Harrison, A. B. C. (Maldon)
Longden, Gilbert


Channon, H.
Harvey, Air Cdre A. V. (Macclesfd)
Lucas, P. B. (Brentford &amp; Chiswick)


Chichester-Clarke, R.
Heath, Edward
Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh


Cole, Norman
Hill, Rt. Hon. Charles (Luton)
Mackeson, Brig, Sir Harry


Cooper, Sqn. Ldr. Albert
Hill, Mrs. E. (Wythenshawe)
MoKibbin, A. J.


Cooper-Key, E. M.
Hill, John (S. Norfolk)
Mackie, J. H. (Galloway)


Corfield, Capt. F. V.
Hinchingbrooke, Viscount
McLaughlin, Mrs. P.


Craddock, Beresford (Spelthorne)
Hirst, Geoffrey
Maclay, Rt. Hon. John


Crookshank, Capt. Rt. Hn. H. F. C.
Hopkinson, Rt. Hon. Henry
MacLeod, John (Ross &amp; Cromarty)


Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E.
Hornsby-Smith, Miss M. P.
Macmillan, Maurice (Halifax)


Crouch, R. F.
Horobin, Sir Ian
Macpherson, Niall (Dumfries)


Dance, J. C. G.
Horsbrugh, Rt. Hon. Dame Florence
Maddan, Martin


Davies,Rt.Hon.Clement(Montgomery)
Howard, Hon. Greville (St. Ives)
Maitland, Cdr. J. F. W. (Horncastle)




Manningham-Buller, Rt. Hn. Sir R.
Price, David (Eastleigh)
Taylor, William (Bradford, N.)


Markham, Major Sir Frank
Price, Henry (Lewisham, W.)
Thomas, Rt. Hn. J. P. L. (Hereford)


Marlowe A. A. H.
Profumo, J. D.
Thomas, Leslie (Canterbury)


Marshall, Douglas
Ralkes, Sir Victor
Thompson, Kenneth (Walton)


Mathew, R.
Ramsden, J. E.
Thompson, Lt.-Cdr.R.(Croydon, S.)


Maude, Angus
Redmayne, M.
Thornton-Kemsley, C. N.


Mawby, R. L.
Rees-Davies, W. R.
Tiley, A. (Bradford, W.)


Maydon, Lt.-Comdr. S. L. C.
Remnant, Hon. P.
Tilney, John (Wavertree)


Milligan, Rt. Hon. W. R.
Renton, D. L. M.
Touche, Sir Gordon


Molson, A. H. E.
Ridsdale, J. E.
Turton, Rt. Hon. R. H.


Moore, Sir Thomas
Robertson, Sir David
Tweedsmuir, Lady


Nabarro, G. D. N.
Roper, Sir Harold
Vaughan-Morgan, J. K.


Nairn, D. L. S.
Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard
Vosper, D. F.


Neave, Airey
Russell, R. S.
Wade, D. W.


Nicholson, Godfrey (Farnham)
Schofield, Lt.-Col. W.
Wakefield, Edward (Derbyshire, W.)


Nicolson, N. (B'n'm'th, E. &amp; Chr'ch)
Scott-Miller, Cmdr. R.
Wall, Major Patrick


Noble, Comdr. A. H. P.
Sharples, Maj. R. C.
Ward, Miss I. (Tynemouth)


Nugent, G. R. H.
Shepherd, William
Waterhouse, Capt. Rt. Hon. C.


O'Neill, Hn. Phelim (Co. Antrim, N.)
Smithers, Peter (Winchester)
Whitelaw, W.S.I.(Penrith &amp; Border)


Osborne, C.
Smyth, Brig. J. G. (Norwood)
Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)


Page, R. G.
Soames, Capt. C.
Wills, G. (Bridgwater)


Pannell, N. A. (Kirkdale)
Speir, R. M.
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Partridge, E.
Spens, Rt. Hn. Sir P. (Kens'g'tn, s.)
Wood, Hon. R.


Peake, Rt. Hon. O.
Stanley, Capt. Hon. Richard
Woollam, John Victor


Peyton, J. W. W.
Stewart, Henderson (Fife, E.)
Yates, William (The Wrekin)


Pilkington, Capt. R. A.
Stoddart-Scott, Col. M.



Pitt, Miss E. M.
Storey, S.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Pott, H. P.
Stuart, R. Hon. James (Moray)
Mr. Oaksbott and


Powell, J. Enoch
Studholme, H. G.
Colonel J. H. Harrison




NOES


Ainsley, J. W.
Grey, C. F.
MacMillan, M. K. (Western Isles)


Allen, Arthur (Bosworth)
Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)


Attlee, Rt. Hon. C. R.
Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)
Mahon, S.


Awbery, S. S.
Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Colne Valley)
Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)


Bacon, Miss Alice
Hamilton, W. W.
Mann, Mrs. Jean


Baird, J.
Hannan, W.
Marquand, Rt. Hon. H. A.


Balfour, A.
Harrison, J. (Nottingham, N.)
Mason, Roy


Bartley, P.
Hastings, S.
Mellish, R. J.


Bence, C. R. (Dunbartonshire, E.)
Hayman, F. H.
Mitchison, G. R.


Benn, Hn. Wedgwood (Bristol, S.E.)
Henderson, Rt. Hn. A. (Rwly Regis)
Monslow, W,


Beswick, F.
Herbison, Miss M.
Morris, Percy (Swansea, W.)


Blackburn, F.
Hewitson, Capt. M.
Morrison,Rt.Hn.Herbert(Lewis'm,S.)


Blenkinsop, A.
Hobson, C. R.
Mort, D. L.


Blyton, W. R.
Holman, P.
Moss, R.


Boardman, H.
Holmes, Horace
Moyle, A.


Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.
Howell, Denis (All Saints)
Neal, Harold (Bolsover)


Bowden, H. W. (Leicester, S.W.)
Hoy, J. H.
Noel-Baker, Francis (Swindon)


Bowles, F. G.
Hubbard, T. F.
Oliver, G. H.


Boyd, T. C.
Hughes, Cledwyn (Anglesey)
Oram, A. E.


Brock way, A. F.
Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)
Oswald, T.


Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)
Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)
Owen, W. J.


Brown, Thomas (Ince)
Hunter, A. E.
Padley, W. E.


Burton, Miss F. E.
Hynd, H. (Accrington)
Paget, R. T.


Carmichael, J.
Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)
Paling, Will T. (Dewsbury)


Champion, A. J.
Irving, S. (Dartford)
Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)


Clunie, J.
Isaacs, Rt. Hon. G. A.
Parker, J.


Coldrick, W.
Janner, B.
Paton, J.


Collick, P. H. (Birkenhead)
Johnson, James (Rugby)
Peart, T. F.


Corbet, Mrs. Freda
Johnston, Douglas (Paisley)
Plummer, Sir Leslie


Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)
Jones, Rt. Hn. A. Creech (Wakefield)
Popplewell, E.


Cullen, Mrs. A.
Jones, David (The Hartlepools)
Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)


Davies, Ernest (Enfield, E.)
Jones, Jack (Rotherham)
Price, Philips (Gloucestershire, W.)


Davies, Harold (Leek)
Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)
Pryde, D. J.


Davies, Stephen (Merthyr)
Jones, T. W. (Merioneth)
Reeves, J.


Deer, G.
Kenyon, C.
Reid, William


de Freitas, Geoffrey
Key, Rt. Hon. C. W.
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Dodds, N. N.
King, Dr. H. M.
Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)


Donnelly, D. L.
Lawson, G. M.
Robinson, Kenneth (St. Pancras, N.)


Edelman, M.
Ledger, R. J.
Rogers, George (Kensington, N.)


Edwards, Rt. Hon. Ness (Caerphilly)
Lee, Frederick (Newton)
Ross, William


Evans, Albert (Islington, S.W.)
Lever, Leslie (Ardwick)
Royle, C.


Evans, Stanley (Wednesbury)




Fernynough, E.
Lewis, Arthur
Shurmer, P. L. E.


Fienburgh, W.
Lipton, Lt.-Col. M.
Silverman, Julius (Aston)


Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)
Logan, D. G.
Silverman, Sydney (Nelson)


Freeman, Peter
McGhee, H. G.
Simmons, C. J. (Brierley Hill)


Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. H. T. N.
McGovern, J.
Skeffington, A. M.


Gibson, C. W.
Mclnnes, J.
Slater, Mrs. H. (Stoke, N.)


Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C.
McKay, John (Wallsend)
Slater, J. (Sedgefield)


Grenfell, Rt. Hon. D. R.
McLeavy, Frank
Sorensen, R. W.







Steele, T.
Turner-Samuels, M.
Williams, Ronald (Wigan)


Stokes, Rt. Hon. R. R. (Ipswich)
Ungoed-Thomas, Sir Lynn
Williams Rt. Hon. T. (Don Valley)


Stones, W. (Consett)
Warbey, W. N.
Williams, W. R. (Openshaw)


Stross, Dr.Barnett (Stoke-on-Trent,C.)
Watkins, T. E.
Willis, E. G. (Edinburgh, E.)


Summerskill, Rt. Hon. E.
Wells, Percy (Faversham)
Winterbottom, Richard


Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield))
West, D. G.
Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.


Taylor, John (West Lothian)
Wheeldon, W. E.



Thomson, George (Dundee, E.)
White, Mrs. Eirene (E. Flint)
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Thornton, E.
White, Henry (Derbyshire, N.E.)
Mr. Wilkins and Mr. Short.


Timmons, J.
Willey, Frederick

EDUCATION SCOTLAND

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Buchan-Hepburn.]

3.46 p.m.

Mr. A. Woodburn: We meet today under the shadow of a great loss to Scotland. Hector McNeil, whose presence we miss on these benches, was one of the most popular Members of the House. He was a hard hitter in debate, but his gift of warm friendliness made him a favourite on all sides. I know of nobody else who was on first-name terms with so many hon. and right hon. Gentlemen. The House has been deprived of one of its most valued and able colleagues. Our greatest loss is that of a friend who always evidenced glowing sympathy for those in distress, and a kindliness to friend and foe alike. I am quite sure that we all mourn his death. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."]
Today, we are to discuss the question of education in Scotland, which, compared with the heat of the debates of the last two or three days, seems to be a passing into the cool waters of reason. The transition from Budget discussion to education debate will, I hope, bring forth more light and less heat. An electric bulb, I believe, produces light in inverse ratio to the amount of heat it gives out; if the heat is reduced there is more light. Perhaps we may be able to do that in discussing education.
It may be thought that education is much less important than Budgets, but so far as our future prosperity is concerned education is perhaps the most important element in our planning for the next generation. The Government, of course, have always taken the view, politically, that they do not believe in planning. It would be a most extraordinary thing if education was not planned; that what a child was to learn, and what was to be

done with the child after it left school, was left just to chance. The Government are, however, proposing very important changes, and I hope that most hon. and right hon. Members have studied the circular of 23rd July, which is closely concerned with the problems arising from the relationship of education to our economic conditions.
In this debate we are considering how the generations coming after us are to be educated so as to fit in with this new electronic and atomic age. As far as I can see, what has been lacking so far is any comprehensive purpose or comprehensive scheme that gives us, and the teachers, a clue to what we are eventually seeking. Scotland, unfortunately, has no raw materials to sell to the world. She has only brains, skill, service, enterprise and the enjoyment of beauty. Complacency in facing our problems will certainly lead to decay. They must be tackled with a purpose. But if the purpose of education and its connection with life is clear, I am satisfied that it can inspire both the pupils and the teachers. Any patchwork arrangement is sure to breed confusion.
There are a great many physical requirements in connection with education, and many of these will be discussed during this debate. Buildings and equipment are, of course, of tremendous importance. The hygienic arrangements for schools may not at first appear to have much to do with education, but when we read in the Press that in one school there is only one wash-hand basin for about 450 children, it does not make it very easy to provide comfort and cleanliness.
These are troubles that we have inherited. With the tremendous problems which have faced us since the war, and still face us, it may not be easy to deal with these troubles promptly, but I hope that the Secretary of State for Scotland is keeping in mind this question of cleanliness and such problems as that of


children on a cold frosty day trying to dry their hands on a wet towel. That sort of thing has a disheartening effect generally, and if something could be done to help I am sure that it would promote better relations in the schools. It may be that, as in the nursery schools, parents could supply their children with towels if proper arrangements were made for them to be looked after. These are small things but cumulatively they are of great significance in the general make-up of a school.
For years we have debated the subject of smaller classes. I am especially interested in the use of school feeding for the teaching of good manners. During the Recess I have been watching some of the television programmes, including one which brings the Armed Forces abroad to our firesides, "Requests from the Forces" it is called. What struck me on hearing some of our Scots lads speaking on the television is the great difficulty they have in finding words to express themselves. I think there is in our schools a lack of this kind of intercourse, and an inability to deal with other people and speak with them.
While we may not be deficient in this respect in the Scottish Grand Committee, many of our Scots lads and girls seem to be handicapped in finding words to express themselves. This might have been a great tragedy if it had not been for Robert Burns. Half the Scots would never have been able to make love, because they have only got Robert Burns' words to say what they could not otherwise say themselves. We are lacking in the ability of emotional expression. True, we have managed and we have pushed on. We have succeeded in some way.
I read in "The Bulletin" that when school children go to Turriff and Ardmiddle to do their mothers' shopping, there is a special smile for them from the shopkeepers because evidently the school cleaner and meal server at their school, Mrs. Elizabeth Mitchell, puts the children on their best behaviour and makes them observe and practise good manners in the school. I have always believed that it is a mistake to treat school feeding merely as a matter of stuffing children with more food. It is one of the most important elements in

teaching good manners, friendliness and hygiene, and it ought to be so utilised.
I must admit that one of the difficulties of education is its dual purpose. We are trying, on the one hand, to educate and train the children to play their part in the industrial life of the nation. On the other hand, there is the other aspect of education, where we try to develop the cultural capacity and ability of the individual. These things come into conflict, and I think that most parents' first desire is to see that children leave school with the chance of getting the best job. That means that the teachers have to concentrate on preparing children to jump through the hoops of certain examinations because if they fail they will be handicapped in their careers. When teachers are pressed to concentrate on this aspect of education, obviously to some extent the other type of education—the development of good manners, culture and the love of knowledge—will suffer.
We must train people for industry, offices and the technical professions. These branches of training seem to fall into different classes of schools, and at once we find class distinction between one school and another. It is to be regretted that we cannot get rid of these class distinctions in our time, so that children will learn at school that when they go into normal life they will all be part of a great community and that whatever part they play, every person will be giving valuable service to his community, whether as a leader of industry or a worker on the grimy soil of the land.
The individual must try to speak and write correctly. I have tried to impress upon the education authorities the necessity for giving children more opportunity of expression. For years I have insisted that there is far too much suppression in the ordinary schools and too little expression. I think that children learn far better by doing things than by having things thumped at them. The more that education can be combined with activity the more the education becomes interesting and the more will the co-operation of the children be ensured. However, these are questions rather of the higher flights of education.
We are faced today with the fundamental problem of prosperity and the necessity to provide education to make it possible for Britain to enjoy prosperity.


The Minister of Education put the matter very clearly recently when he said:
We have to shape our education system so that we can meet the call for a very large number of trained men and women who will support the top flight scientists and make possible the application of their discoveries to commercial and useful purposes. We cannot afford to waste a single boy or girl who may by ability and hard work, acquire technical skill, whether of a humble or a high nature."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 21st July, 1955; Vol. 544, c. 600.]
Those are the dimensions of the urgency of this problem.
The circular issued by the Secretary of State in July, which I recommend to every hon. Member, may have a similar purpose, but I have a feeling that it is not linked up with that purpose and that the connection between it and the great problem which we have to face is not brought closely enough to the attention of the teachers. I hope that there is some method by which the teachers and education authorities can be persuaded to read that circular and give effect to it.
I hope that the Secretary of State with his great authority, will consider giving a lead to Scotland to step boldly into this new atomic, chemical and electronic age, and show how Scottish education is to be geared to provide our youngsters with the opportunity of playing their part. There are great opportunities in this age not only for working but for leadership. Our population has certain attributes and a love of education which is traditional and which could be drawn upon with great advantage.
The Appleton Committee has reported its concern about the shortage of science and mathematics teachers but in his own report the Secretary of State devotes most of the first 23 pages to what seems to be the weakest rung in our educational ladder, the primary schools. I am very glad that he has arranged for panels of teachers to study the booklet on "The Primary School in Scotland." Some of the work which the Educational Advisory Committee of Scotland did was very fine indeed, and the reports which it has published could take us a long way towards improved education in general. The report on the primary school is of great importance, and I believe that if teachers realised that this is what is wanted of them great progress could be made.
It was urged upon me when I was Secretary of State that I should abolish home lessons altogether. From the point of view of the kind of home lessons which have been the custom in the past, there was certainly an argument for abolishing them. Those lessons kept a child to his desk after he went home and kept him doing lessons. I have seen a child weeping over the table because he did not know what the problem was about.
But I emphasised that home lessons need not be of that character at all. The idea of a project in which the child is sent out to do a job, with a sense of adventure, enlists the co-operation of the child. If teachers would use their imagination to give children that kind of task, which has to be educative and interesting, the children would, for instance, investigate their own town or its environs and do work which would automatically provide them with both interest and education and would stimulate their personal initiative and responsibility.
If there is one advantage which the public schools have over the ordinary school in Scotland it is that they train boys and girls to undertake personal responsibility for doing things on their own. If we could do more of that in our ordinary schools, then the standards of the primary school would increase considerably. I recognise that when we come to the Higher School Leaving Certificates pupils must get down to hard study. There is no getting away from that. The Secretary of State's own conclusion is very serious. He says:
A more definite break with traditional class teaching is imperative if both the ablest and least able pupils are to have full justice done to them.
The word "class" is used in the sense of the classroom. A few moments ago I was talking about the other sort of class.
I wish the Secretary of State every success. If he can get that point of view brought into the educational system he will have done a good deal. It is a pity that circumstances prevent us from developing the nursery schools far more. Anyone who has been in nursery schools and seen the effect on the children when they come under the influence of education at a very early age will regret that this system cannot be extended to more children. It not only educates the children but has a powerful effect on educating the mothers. Some of the results of


nursery school teaching have been remarkable. I wish hon. Members could visit some of the schools in Edinburgh, where they have been developed perhaps to a greater extent than almost anywhere else.
Sometimes children learn wrong things before they go to school, and it takes a long time at school before they "unlearn" them. It would be better if they did not learn such things in the first place. It would save time afterwards. Unless we nurse the early roots of education with care we cannot expect to have the glorious blooms we want.
It is obvious that much teaching is wasted because the children's ability to read is insufficiently developed. Research on educability was carried out by Professor MacLellan in the Dundee Research Organisation and his report was published while I was Secretary of State. In the study of arithmetic, for example, it was discovered that many children failed in arithmetic not because they could not count but because they could not understand the terms put to them. They did not grasp the meaning of such terms as "subtract" and "divide." The use of simple and clear terms is essential to understanding other problems. Unless children understand the words, and they are simple, many children may fail to realise to the full their innate capacity.
It is the fact that children do not understand which makes them want to leave education. I have had long experience in adult education. At the beginning it was a problem to persuade adults to accept more education. Their idea of education was what had been stuffed into them at school and wild horses would not drag them back for more. That is an awful reflection on what happened in the schools in the old days. Children leaving school were glad to be rid of it.
Our problem is to make them interested in education, and if we are to succeed and to get the best from our children and to have children wanting the best education, we must capture their enthusiasm and imagination. That is not an easy job. People are paid very high salaries, and others are now to spend millions on commercial television, in order to capture the interest and imagination of the public. That kind of public appeal is no less necessary, in some ways, for the children.

We must advertise efficiently to get the children to buy our education.
Of course, we cannot do that unless we get the teachers. If teachers are to be harassed and to work against the collar all the time they will not have the time, the energy or the heart to inspire the children. I have seen great variations in teachers. I visited a potato-lifting area. There, I found, on a wet day, teachers in one hostel standing about smoking while the children miserably tried to pass the time. On the same day I saw another hostel where a teacher—a science teacher, born and bred in Bridgeton—had the children all busy working out scientific experiments and making all sorts of gadgets. He had introduced a spirit of adventure. These children would have been willing to make spacemen's suits, without the slightest difficulty, if he had asked them. His pupils did not want to leave the potato lifting to go back to Glasgow because they were so interested. This teacher had not forgotten his boyhood. He could still think as a boy and get the interest of the children.
That capacity is needed, and not every teacher has it. I think that some of the people who are appointed as psychological advisers—in the case of ladies, so that the children can sob on their bosoms—might do a useful job in seeking out the children who are not interested in education and seeing whether they can discover the reason. Personal interviews of that kind might possibly do more good than allowing children to concentrate on their adolescent emotions. It may be diverting these people a little to something more important.
The great problem among teachers, of course, is in the higher ranks in mathematics and science. I want to ask the Joint Under-Secretary whether he has any report to make on the negotiations which are taking place with the teachers about the problems of the science and mathematics staff. I understand that there is a possibility of discussing higher salaries, which may make some contribution, but in the long run it is not a solution, because more people want graduates today than there are graduates leaving the universities. A mere auction sale which will send them backwards and forwards between industry and the schools will not add one graduate to the number available. As far as we know the reservoir is


not equal to the demand. I think that is generally agreed.
There are, perhaps, one or two solutions. One is to get more children to continue at school. The circular which the Secretary of State issued is very accurate in its summing up. I cannot remark on the conclusions it gives but there is one conclusion which I must note. There are still 100 per cent. of the children being trained for the universities, whereas 95 per cent. of them will never go there. I think the time has come when the universities should co-operate with, and not just dictate to, education authorities about the curriculum. The universities must take into account that industry is not run by graduates alone and that unless the other workers are equally intelligent to carry out what the scientists are deciding or planning we shall never succeed as a country.
It ought to be possible to harmonise those educational requirements with the work that has to be done in industry and in the country. I am afraid that there is still a little too much of the Latin-Greek complex preventing full co-operation between industry and university. I am not against "culture," but I am opposed to its domination preventing a proper relationship between university curricula and the curricula of our schools.
There are other proposals, such as those which the Appleton Committee recommend. Are we to stop tightening the test or to slacken the test? So far as we can see standards required of the entrants to universities and for graduates has been getting tighter and tighter. If we accept the fact that people have a certain innate capacity and there are all sorts of levels of that capacity, as the restriction is tightened fewer and fewer will get through. We ourselves are automatically restricting the number of graduates we require by continually tightening the requirements.
Unless it is to be argued that tightening the requirements improves people's brain capacity and that in the next generation we shall get more people of that type of brain, I cannot see any hope in this at all. It is Darwinism turned upside down, because the number of years it takes to improve the species that way is about one million and that will not solve our problem. The Appleton Report says:

It is our view that, while each profession should attract entrants of the highest ability, many professions should enlarge their lower ranks with persons of less ability than those they seek to recruit at present.
A tremendously important part of the problem is that we are not making the right use of the graduates we have. Many graduates are doing jobs which call for less than their capacity. There should be a survey of graduates and of their use. At one time I had requests that probation officers should be made graduates. I suggested that it was probably the graduates' salary they wanted, not the qualification. Naturally, that is the case, but where there is a scarcity of graduates it is wrong when they are capable of doing the higher jobs that they should be doing the lower jobs.
I agree with the Appleton Report. We are losing a fair number of teachers because there is not enough flexibility. Recently, I came across a young lady who took every subject but French for her degree. The professor advised her to go to France and study. She did so and came back, but failed again when she had another go at it. I am satisfied that that girl, with her experiences in France, has probably more facility with French than 70 per cent. of the others who got through the examination merely by swotting, and that she would have made a good teacher because she is qualified in the other subjects. But she has gone into a big department store at a considerable salary.
I wonder whether we are losing many people by being too wide in our demands that they must be expert in so many subjects. Is it possible that some people are good mathematicians and not necessarily good linguists and that people can be good scientists but cannot master German or French? These are matters which should be very carefully analysed. Have the Government examined the problem and come to any conclusion? Are they to enlarge the reservoir and bring in more of those capable of higher learning and going to university? In Scotland, we have complaints from the students that the allowances at university are insufficient. We had one from the university in Glasgow this morning. These allowances are now a deterrent to young men and women carrying out their university course. What are the plans of the Government; what are they doing about it? Are they taking steps to ensure that


graduates are properly used and that good use is made of their various abilities?
Our main failure is to use the interests of the pupils. Here, I believe, television has great possibilities. By its use it is easier to understand facts and figures and a month's concentration of study in an intricate problem can be brought to a person's mind by these wonderful visual aids in a matter of a few minutes. Mathematics is a difficult subject, but it can be taught much better by means of television than by wireless. It is easier for people to concentrate with their eyes than with their ears. People grasp things immediately when they see them, whereas it may take a long time to understand by hearing about them. A great deal more use should be made of television.
The Secretary of State should urge on the B.B.C. and I.T.A. not to waste a lot of time on more frivolous stuff during the day, but to use this medium for some hours in getting across some of the more difficult problems. Teachers trying to teach mathematics and science in lonely outposts in Scotland cannot get the necessary apparatus for the kind of teaching which would be possible by T.V. This is a proper use for T.V. and ought to be brought into the problem of spreading an interest in mathematics and science.
Most children are reading spacemen thrillers. It does not matter where one goes one sees them with spacemen uniforms. Why not get some of the spacemen thriller writers to recruit some of the children for science? The easiest way to understand science is to become really interested. Once that is achieved a teacher can encourage children to take up teaching.
The main problem, in the long run, is to interest the children. We are concerned, of course, about the conditions and status of teachers, but the real material of education is children. We are dealing there with the finest of nature's material—the human brain. People who work on that material are privileged. Those who educate a child are doing a greater work than those who work on any other material that exists. Therefore, it is a privilege to be a teacher and those in the profession who love their work enjoy their life. They have seen products which have brought great credit and honour to them.
We require teachers to come into teaching not merely for the salary, but also for the honour. We do not want to deprive them of the salary because we give them the honour, but teachers have suffered a loss in prestige in recent times. Too many people want to become doctors. We want to restore the honour which teachers used to have when the teacher was the man who got the "lad of pairts" and that made him a great man who could look hack to his teacher as the man who helped him on his way, put him in the way of knowledge and helped to develop his capacity. I hope that recruiting by the Secretary of State will have success in what he does, but unless there is inspiration and purpose behind it I am afraid that it may fail.

4.20 p.m.

Major Sir Guy Lloyd: We have listened with rapt attention to an admirable and informative speech by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn), delivered in his very best vein, and with which none of us on this side of the House could, in my judgment, possibly disagree. I am happy to find myself in such general agreement with the right hon. Gentleman, and I hope that the rest of the debate will show this general common agreement between us, which is rather rare in other directions and in other places.
I have no doubt that we shall have the pleasure of hearing my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State reply in due course. It falls to my lot—and I rarely attempt to catch your eye, Sir, in debate—to say a few words on something about which I am particularly keen and to which, in his closing remarks, the right hon. Gentleman opposite paid some attention himself. I ask him to excuse me if, in my rôle as a back bencher, I do not attempt to follow him in some of the other directions in which he informed us so satisfactorily this afternoon.
I want to speak with a deep feeling of sincerity about what I believe, at any rate, is the apparent effect on the morale, as it will certainly be the effect on the recruitment, of male teachers which, I feel, is almost certainly bound to follow the implementation of the recent draft regulations on teachers' salaries. Already, we have seen that there has been formed a Scottish Schoolmasters' Association,


which has broken away from the Educational Institute of Scotland, which has been hitherto the spokesman for teachers throughout Scotland, male and female.
The unity of that organisation, which had been respected by all who were interested in education, which had for long been listened to with respect by Governments of all parties, is now quite definitely, and I think seriously, broken, and, from the point of view of the teaching profession being represented by an association which could represent all and speak with one voice, that is, I think we must all agree, unfortunate. It shows that there is a very grave disgruntlement among male teachers in Scotland at the situation which they feel is developing, or which they fear is developing.
They consider, and I think it would be difficult to deny it, that the E.I.S. is at present overwhelmingly dominated by women. Whether that is a good thing or not I would not argue here; I merely state it as a fact. If it is, it is perhaps not unnatural that some of the male teachers, as they look ahead and see the writing on the wall, are somewhat worried by the fact. Indeed, I think it would be difficult to disagree with those who are in close touch with the position, as I claim to be, that male teachers, rightly or wrongly, are disgruntled at the present time.
To some extent, all the teaching profession is rather disgruntled, but by and large this disgruntlement and discontent is concentrated at present among the male teachers and schoolmasters rather than the women, who are very satisfied and pleased—and I would not blame the women for being satisfied and pleased—at the fact that equal pay for equal work is to be implemented, even though they doubtless feel that it could have been implemented quicker than the Government propose to do.
The male teachers and schoolmasters, as I understand the matter, feel that the logical corollary of the principle of the Goschen formula is likely seriously to affect their prospects of increased salaries and advancement and promotion in the future. They feel also that their prospects and living standards are seriously retarded at a time when their average salaries have increased since 1951 by only about 5 per cent., and we all know

that the cost of living has increased very substantially. Even though the figure is not 5 per cent., the cost of living has gone up a good deal more than their salaries have gone up, as I understand, while industrial wages, salaries and earnings of those in other categories have gone up very considerably more than theirs.
They now feel that women are to receive all the advantages of increased salaries in future, and that there is little prospect that they will get any at all, especially with regard to the Goschen formula, which limits the amount of money which can be spent on education in any case. They fear that there will be far fewer male teachers recruited into the profession. The women may feel that that is a good thing, but there must be many in Scotland who feel that, on the whole, it would be most unfortunate if, in future, our boys have to be taught almost entirely by women.
There are at least some of us who believe that, while women do a magnificent job of work in very difficult circumstances in the schools, none the less there are many boys, of whom, frankly, I was one, who are better for having been taught by men rather than women. Admittedly, it is a matter of opinion, and we can leave those who prefer it so to be taught by women. I am one of those who think that I would rather have a boy of mine taught by a man.
If there are some here who would agree with me about that, there is something in the schoolmasters' contention that the recruitment of male teachers will fall as a result of the development of the Government's plans, and that, I believe, will not be advantageous for the education of our boys in Scotland. I think that we need more men teachers, not fewer. I am fairly sure that schoolmasters are right in their fears that the plans which are being developed will mean fewer male teachers in Scotland. Indeed, there is not much incentive for male teachers to come forward at present into the profession when much higher salaries are being paid for similarly qualified men and men of similar abilities in other activities, in the Civil Service and especially in industry. I cannot but help feeling that it is unfortunate that we have to look forward to that almost inevitable fact.
Perhaps my right hon. Friend, or one of his Joint Under-Secretaries, may be able to assure me that my fears are groundless, and that the schoolmasters have no right to think that the recruiting of male teachers will fall in numbers. If so, I shall be delighted, but I am at present very sceptical on the matter.
The right hon. Member for East Stirlingshire has been referring to the Appleton Report, which we have all studied with deep concern and interest. I do not think there would be any difference of opinion on either side of the House about either the importance or the significance of that Report. Those who framed it, Government spokesmen from time to time, as we recall, many trusted leaders of industry, including, I know, two or three leading trade unionists, have all concurred that there is and is likely to be an increasing shortage in the higher grades throughout industry—throughout the nation for that matter—in skill and in technical and scientific knowledge.
The right hon. Gentleman opposite is perfectly right. It is a matter of grave concern for the whole country, but if we are not to be able to get the necessary skill and technique into the teaching profession, mainly among the men, and if we are still likely to be very short—and we are—and if there is little prospect that we shall increase the numbers in that direction, then I fear that all the misgivings of the Appleton Report about the numbers of skilled and technical men in industry and elsewhere are likely to be justified, for these men have to be taught.
If we are to get men to go into industry with the higher skills and techniques, and with scientific and mathematical knowledge, they will all have to be taught. They cannot all be taught in industry; many of them will, in the first instance, have to be taught in the schools. Most of the brighter boys will make their start there and learn to be fascinated with the subjects which they will develop later. I fear very much that we shall find a great shortage in those directions.
I want to turn for a moment to another development which I fear in relation to the draft regulations, and that is that the most important question of being able to get technical teachers in our technical schools and on technical subjects in the

schools is likely to be seriously affected by the regulations. I notice that there is to be a reduction in salary for all new teachers in technical schools and on technical subjects in schools, which seems to me to be rather unfortunate and derogatory to this very important branch of the teaching profession.
We need more technical teachers and more technical students. How are we to get them if one of the first things we do is deliberately to lower the salaries of the technical teachers who are coming into the technical profession from now onwards? It is true that those at present there are not having their salaries altered, but I cannot see any justification for deliberately insulting this branch of the profession by lowering the salaries of those entering it in future.
This is presumably in order to make them equal with the women and to satisfy the women in that respect. I have no doubt that there are many women who do fine work in technical education, but I am sure that there is more scope for men in technical education. It seems to me that our need is more men rather than more women in that direction.
I do not wish to be misinterpreted. I do not decry in any way the value of the work which the women are doing. However, I am told authoritatively that a woman teacher of Gaelic, for instance, will get more pay now than many who will in future be teachers on the technical side of the teaching profession. If that is so, I cannot believe that it is something of which the people of Scotland would approve.
I want for a moment to turn to another matter in which for many years I have been deeply interested.

Miss Margaret Herbison: As the hon. and gallant Gentleman is turning to another subject, might I put a question to him? In the main, he has deprecated the regulations, and he has referred to the Scottish Schoolmasters' Association, which, I can assure him, was in being many years before the regulations were made.

Mr. Cyril Bence: At least twenty years.

Miss Herbison: Is the hon. and gallant Gentleman not in favour of the partial rate for the job which the regulations,


which I criticise in other ways, will bring about in Scotland, for that is what the tenor of his speech suggested?

Sir G. Lloyd: That is wrong. I thought I had made myself clear. I have nothing whatever against the principle of equal pay for equal work, which has been accepted by both parties in the country and has passed through at least two General Elections without serious dispute. I have always admitted the principle, and in no word that I have had to say have I disputed it. All I was wishing to discuss was its effect as represented by the fears and anxieties of the male teaching profession in Scotland, at any rate a great many of them.
Although it may well be that the Scottish Schoolmasters' Association has existed for a long time, it has succeeded in winning away a great many people from the E.I.S. as a result of their fears about recent developments. I trust that I satisfy the hon. Lady. I am in no way against equal pay, nor do I wish in the slightest degree to put the clock back in that respect. It is only in relation to the consequence upon the male teachers that I am considering it.
To turn to the subject of administration, I am one of those who took part in our proceedings on the last Scottish Education Act, when Mr. Tom Johnston was Secretary of State and chief architect of the Measure which passed with remarkable unanimity among all hon. Members. It is within my recollection, and must be within the recollection of many others who were in the House at the time, that owing to certain circumstances—a General Election was impending, and the war was ending—it was not possible for us to include in the Act many measures relating to the administrative side of education which Mr. Tom Johnston had in mind and which some of us had been discussing as part of the Act.
A long time has elapsed since then, but nothing has been done. It was a lack in the Act. I never doubted that something would be done some day before very long. It was generally admitted at the time that there was no opportunity to go into it then. The subject was a little controversial, and we had a Coalition Government, and it was felt that it would be better to leave it to the future; but

surely it was the near future that we had in mind. Now long years have passed, and nobody has said a word.
Are we satisfied with the present administration of our educational system in Scotland? Must it continue as it is for ever when, only a comparatively a few years ago, we were seriously considering its reform and only abandoned the attempt because of the purely exceptional circumstances of the day? If the Government could find time within the next two or three years to grasp that nettle—I do not think it is much of a nettle—they would find a considerable measure of unity between both parties in the House and in Scotland on the matter.
I am sure that the morale of the teaching profession will never be as satisfactory as I should like it to be until we give teachers a greater share and a greater say in education itself on the administrative side. We have the medical profession represented at every stage of the administration in the National Health Service. The teachers are, to all intents and purposes, not represented at all on the administrative side of their profession except for consultative purposes. This is a slur which they have felt for many years. We ought to do something about it and encourage them, for, after all, they are just as expert in their own profession and in their own way as members of other professions are. We should give them an opportunity to share in the administrative side and to be represented by those whom they choose on the administrative side of this great profession.
I hope I have not kept the House too long. I hope that my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State will feel able at least to say why nothing has been done or hinted at and why it is not proposed to do anything about the revision of the administrative side of education in Scotland in the near future.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. J. Henderson Stewart): Will my hon. and gallant Friend tell me what he means? I do not quite follow him when he talks about changing the administrative system. Does he mean in the detail of the Department's work, or does he mean something more than that?

Sir G. Lloyd: My hon. Friend was in the House when we discussed the composition of education committees and


whether or not there was to be co-option, and if so, how much and who was to be co-opted, and all that kind of thing. We discussed the composition of the committees which were to administer education and to what extent local authorities were to be given powers to co-opt and so on.

4.40 p.m.

Mr. J. Grimond: I should like to be included among those for whom the right hon. Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) spoke when he expressed the general regret of Scottish Members at the very sad death of Mr. Hector McNeil.
The hon. and gallant Member for Renfrew, East (Sir G. Lloyd) has said that he is in favour of equal pay in principle, but he is more doubtful about it in practice. I do not think that having equal pay in principle will satisfy the women. They want to see it at some time put into practice. It is obvious that whenever it is put into practice it will lead to difficulty. The main difficulty that we meet in putting it into practice in education is that women are so much under-paid in various other professions.
I see no reason, merely because men are so much better at doing some things, such as cookery and dress designing, why women should not be granted equal pay for equal work, but I concede that certain safeguards must be introduced. Everyone will agree that women must not become cheap labour, that is to say, an excuse for lowering the pay which either men or women teachers can obtain. If there is any substance in the fears which the hon. and gallant Member expressed, particularly about science and technical teachers, like him I very much hope that the Joint Under-Secretary will be able to tell us that those fears are unjustified.
Secondly, I fully appreciate that there are teachers who have responsibilities for families, and so on, and who are in a peculiarly difficult position today. But women as well as men may have family responsibilities, and if there is a case for making it up to those people who have these special responsibilities it would seem to me to apply to both sexes.
I want to speak chiefly about the content and purpose of education in junior secondary schools, but before doing so I should like to say a few words about school building. The tendency lately has been to spend very large sums on new

schools and very little, if any, on old schools. There are in my constituency some old school buildings which will not be replaced for many years. Indeed, many do not need to be replaced.
They are essentially sound buildings and will probably last a good deal longer than some of the new prefabricated buildings which have been put up recently, but they require repair and additions, and playgrounds added to them. Above all, some of the school lavatories are an absolute disgrace. I urge the Government to consider whether it would not be worth spending a few hundreds of pounds on some of these old schools, which will be there for some years, and especially to look at the question of the condition of the lavatories in some of the rural schools.
As to the junior secondary schools, first of all, I do not like the name. I think that the name is condemned by the first and second paragraphs of this excellent Report on Junior Secondary Education. The junior secondary school is not a kind of inferior copy of some senior secondary school and we ought to have a new name. The junior secondary school is the final stage of education for a great many children and, therefore, must give a balanced education for life. That is a rather tall order and the first thing that the House should bear in mind is the burden that is placed on school teachers today.
It must have been bad enough to teach in the old days of the three "Rs," but if teachers have to teach everything that is contained in this Report they are wonderful people. Home craft, science, agriculture, fishing, music—there is nothing almost that the secondary school teacher must not be prepared to take up and know something about—
And still they gazed and still the wonder grew,
That one small head could carry all he knew.
Let us look after these teachers and see that they are reasonably paid. I wonder, too, what chance they have of refreshing themselves and bringing themselves up to date. Suppose a teacher wants to go abroad, which is a perfectly reasonable thing but a very expensive business, or go to a university for six months in a year, has he any means of doing so? I wonder whether the Carnegie Fund foundation might turn its attention to helping teachers


in this way as an addition to the other wonderful work it has already done for Scottish education.
Education in the junior secondary schools today differs from the old ideas of Scottish education primarily in two ways. First. it is very much broader: it sets out to be attractive rather than menacing. The right hon. Member for East Stirlingshire has stressed the efforts that are made to interest children and to draw out their abilities rather than to frighten them into doing work. Secondly, modern education, of course, does much more for the stupid child. In the old days the dominie had to concentrate a great deal on the children whom he thought the cleverest. It is absolutely right that we should offer all children a broad education for life, and it is quite right that we should try to interest them and draw the best out of them and not try to frighten them.
But two deficiencies emerge, not so much from anything wrong with the schools themselves as possibly from the whole system of bringing up children today. Throughout the Report the tendency is to stress the importance of not putting too much on the children. I agree that we are talking about fairly young children but, on the other hand, this is the last stage in their education. I suggest that they should be encouraged to stretch their minds and reach out, to use their abilities to the maximum and possibly indeed to grasp at things which are slightly beyond what their capabilities might seem to warrant. I have come to the conclusion that an external examination would be no bad thing. Everybody dislikes examinations and I confess to changing my mind on this point. I do not want examinations to weed out the cleverest children from the less clever. But as Dr. Johnson said of hanging, an examination wonderfully concentrates the mind.

Mr. Walter Elliot: Dr. Johnson said nothing of the sort. He was speaking of "the prospect" of hanging.

Mr. Grimond: I agree. I should have said "the prospect" of examination.
I read and learned many things because I knew I had to face an examination, things which I never would have learned

otherwise. An external examination and some reward for the successful saying "Well done" is no bad thing. I notice today a reluctance in young people to undertake responsibility. I know that I see very small samples and I may be quite wrong, but I think that there is a reluctance to lead and to be singled out from one's fellows. That may be a defect of their virtues. Many people do not want to push themselves forward. I do not want to exaggerate the advantage of so doing, but in the North this is serious.
Today, we find it difficult to get people to take responsibility, to lead and to put themselves forward in new enterprise or to come forward in local government. Voluntary organisations do something to cure this. There are the Boy Scouts and movements of that kind and schools like the Outward Bound Trust, and a great many schoolmasters out of school work very hard in giving voluntary training and encouragement. This is a general difficulty in bringing up children and I do not necessarily blame the secondary schools, but I should like the junior secondary schools to see whether they can rectify this shortcoming to some extent and encourage their pupils to take more responsibility.

Mr. William Ross: Can the hon. Member tell us how he reconciles this desire for an external examination with an equally well phrased desire for brighter curricula, new adventure and experiment, because the one thing that damps experiment is the existence of external examinations?

Mr. Grimond: I am not convinced that that is necessarily so and many schoolmasters agree with me. I agree that if an examination is hung over children like a guillotine it can have a bad effect, but I do not agree, for example, that all university examinations necessarily cramp university education. I bring the matter forward as something which I think now needs some consideration.
There is another defect in the junior secondary system which I want to mention. The system—I do not say the junior secondary schools but the whole system of which they are a part—has, in my area, failed to instil into young pupils a desire to stay in their own districts. And I am afraid that it does not really fit


them to do so. There again, many schoolmasters do their best in a private capacity to encourage them and to teach the sort of things which are needed in country districts and in the islands. But the prevailing wind, so to speak, is inclined to blow young pupils away. The magnet is the office desk in the big town.
I do not want to prevent a child from going who really wants to go; but equally, I do not want to see a child who is prepared to stay unable to carry on with a good sound education in his own district. That, I take it, is the object of the junior secondary school. I would suggest that the clue to this is technical education, but not in the very advanced things taught in the general sense. We all know, and have read the Appleton Report on this, that, in general, we are behind in technical education.
I want to say a word about the sort of education needed in the constituency that I represent. I believe that the junior secondary school when it deals with things such as agriculture and fishing has to deal with them in conjunction with a scheme of further education, and, of course, if possible, with apprenticeship schemes. The Shetland County Council is trying to establish a sea school in the country in Shetland and not in the town of Lerwick. That is most important. I hope that it will receive every encouragement. I hope, also, that every encouragement will be given to teaching knitting and weaving. These must be linked to our local industries, I think it is true to say that weaving is taught in only one junior secondary school in the whole of Shetland. There is only one apprentice-weaver and only two further educational courses in agriculture. That is not nearly good enough in a crofting county.
Our further education, at the moment, is a failure. A great many devoted schoolmasters make a success of a particular course, and many people get amusement and some instruction out of these further educational courses, but it is not really on a professional basis, as, I think, the Report shows. I do not think, for instance, that gardening need be taught in a junior secondary school. What I should like to see is professional agriculture, weaving, knitting—so far as my constituency is concerned—navigation, and so on, taught on a really professional

basis by fully qualified travelling teachers, so that people can make a living when they leave school.

Mr. Woodburn: In Ross-shire and Aberdeenshire there are agricultural schools which seem to comply with the specifications which the hon. Member is laying down. Is it not a matter for his county council to consider what other people have done?

Mr. Grimond: I know the Ross-shire school very well. I am not sure how successful it is and I do not believe that we can leave this entirely to the local authority. My local authorities are very small ones. To get this on a really professional basis requires a great deal of help and money from the central Government. The whole burden of my point is that it must be on a professional basis. We have to give these people the education which will help them to make a good living in the areas in which they have to live. That can only be done by an integrated system of secondary education, further education and apprenticeship up to a high standard.
I believe that the junior secondary school, apart from its name, has the germs in it of a good education, but I am not certain that it is linked up sufficiently with a well-thought-out scheme of technical education, designed to meet local needs. If all these difficulties were met, I think that it could be developed into a most valuable part of the educational system of this country.

4.54 p.m.

Mr. J. R. H. Hutchison: The hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) touched on a problem which concerns and worries a large part of Scotland, and I have no doubt that what worries the constituency the hon. Member represents is the roving spirit and the difficulty in persuading young people to continue in contentment the life to which their parents were accustomed. I am not against the spirit of enterprise—far from it. It was the Scots who went abroad and set up industries and enterprises all over the world which have done much good to the progress of the world. At the same time, it is a great problem in the Highlands and Islands, and one which I can understand the hon. Gentleman is very concerned about.
In this matter, opinion has changed to a considerable extent. The older generation was content to sit in its islands and find a living there. It thought its home the finest place in the world. That is now tending to change. The older generation's point of view is illustrated by what was said to a friend of mine who went to see an old friend who lived on an island. I think it was the island of Skye. She was the mother of a considerable family and he was asking after the sons. "Where is Angus?" he asked, and the mother replied, "Angus has gone off to some other island, maybe it is Britain." That was the sort of standard she attached to the island of Skye compared with the mainland of Great Britain. I respect that point of view.
It is curious that out of this considerable report so much that has been said already, and so well said by my hon. Friend, should touch on the point, also made by the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland, of this rather vexed and troubled question of equal pay. My hon. Friend has very adequately developed a case which is worrying a number of people quite a bit and, consequently, it will curtail what I was gong to say to a considerable extent.
I should, however, like to add to what he has said. The Schoolmasters' Association, in the views which they represented to the Educational Institute of Scotland, pleaded, or made a case, for some system of family and dependants' allowances where these were applicable. I do not think that they would object, nor, indeed, would I, to these family and dependants' allowances being paid to either a male or female teacher where it was clearly shown that the female teacher was equally entitled. But the final regulations, as I understand them, make no such provision. As my hon. Friend said, there is a general shortage of teachers throughout Scotland, and as he developed his argument it seemed to me to be clear that, as things stand just now, unless some sort of further provision is made, we shall aggravate that shortage of teachers, certainly of the male sex.
I should like to say a little on this question of equal pay in general. The law of the country, so far as I can see it, still recognises the man to be the breadwinner. It imposes on his shoulders

responsibilities for the family such as have not yet reached, at any rate in the majority of cases, the shoulders of women. There is a bias in the direction of saying that in family life the man is the leader and has greater responsibilities. An example of that is the very rare number of cases where a woman is called upon to pay alimony; and who has heard of a man either bringing or succeeding in a breach of promise case? That is an unfortunate and unhappy piece of legislation which many of us would like to see taken away.
There is still inherent in British law that conception of things. If that responsibility, leadership, and "breadwinner-ship," if I may coin a word, is still regarded as being the man's, then surely the salary should take that into account. If the equal salary, with no provision for dependants and family, is in fact to be fixed on a basis for a woman, it will then be too little, if we add in those responsibilities, to attract the men. If, on the other hand, it is fixed for both sexes on the basis of a man, it will be more than need to be paid to a woman who has not got those responsibilities.
I think that this agitation for equal pay is very dangerous to women. I am going a little outside the field of education for a moment, because I would like them to realise where this may lead. In industry, if the demand goes as far as that, I think that ultimately they may work themselves completely out of jobs. Because—and it is no criticism of women; indeed, it is something which one must admire and be proud of—the average woman intends, after she has spent some time in her job or in industry, to get married and have a family.
However, any industrialist will say that both with men and with women the first year or so is really unprofitable. The man and the woman are learning their jobs. He will add, however, that where he employs a man there is a greater probability, once he has lost some money in allowing him to learn his job in the first two years, of getting that value back in the subsequent years, whereas in the case of a woman that employment may well be, and generally is, rather short-lived. So that if this demand for equal pay goes on and spreads to industry, women may easily find themselves, in a time when there is less full employment than there is now,


prejudicing their own chances of getting employment.
I wanted to say this because, apart from what I have been saying about industry, these are broadly the views which are held by the Scottish Schoolmasters' Association. They complain bitterly that the views which they wanted to represent have not been taken into account. Rightly or wrongly, they say that this is due to the fact that in the teaching profession only 34 per cent. of the members are men and 66 per cent. are women.
As I close, I do not want it to be thought that I am not an advocate of equal pay, but I am only an advocate of it when all the responsibilities of each sex, and indeed as between the members of each sex, are taken into account, and when the true value of their continuing employment has been calculated, and when the law recognises in all its forms equality before that law.

5.3 p.m.

Mr. G. M. Thomson: The hon. Gentleman the Member for Scotstoun (Mr. J. R. H. Hutchison) will forgive me if I confess that I did not fully understand his argument, any more than I understood the argument of his predecessor, the hon. and gallant Member for Renfrew, East (Sir G. Lloyd). As far as I could make out, both are enthusiastically in favour of the principle of equal pay and both take the strongest objection to advancing towards it.

Mr. Hutchison: May I put the hon. Gentleman right? I said I was in favour of equal pay with a calculation for equal responsibilities; that is to say, something like family or dependants' allowances added to the statutory pay.

Mr. James Carmichael: That is the case of the Educational Institute of Scotland.

Mr. Thomson: As my hon. Friend points out, this is the case of the Educational Institute of Scotland. I have no doubt that the problems of applying equal pay are many and complicated. The hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) mentioned some of them, but if we draw differences of responsibility between one sex and another, we must also begin to draw differences of responsibility within the

sexes, and we normally take account of those by the Income Tax mechanisms rather than by the suggestion made by the hon. Gentleman.
In any case, surely the point is that the principle of equal pay is important, and therefore it is important to make the best possible progress towards it. The attitude that has been expressed from the benches opposite tonight is not one that is likely to encourage very much progress towards applying the principle of equal pay. However, I think that the speeches made by the hon. Gentleman and his hon. and gallant Friend underline two important aspects of education.
We had from my right hon. Friend the Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) one of his characteristically able and characteristically passionate speeches on the content of education. There is a great deal of educational work and of educational theory which is common ground between parties in this House. We may have our differences about various ideas but they are not differences that coincide with party lines, and that is a good thing.
But of course there are also attitudes towards education in which there are different outlooks on the two sides of this House, and that is also, as it should be, because education is closely linked with the kind of society that we are trying to build, and naturally there should be differences in outlook between the Conservative side of the House and the Socialist side of the House on that question, differences that are bound to reflect themselves in the kind of educational structure that we want in the country.
In the short time at my disposal I want to draw attention to the long way we still have to go in creating real equality of opportunity in this country for our children. We all of us, everywhere in the House, agree with the general principle of equality of opportunity, but we often forget just how long a distance there is to go, even though we have made progress of which we can be rightly proud.
The case for real equality of opportunity rests on two premises, one the individual and the other one the community interest. In the first case we want to give all children an equal opportunity of developing their own personalities and potentialities. We do not believe, of


course, that children are all of equal capacity and ability, but we believe profoundly that all children are of equal worth. This sounds a platitude, but when we come to execute it in educational policy, we begin quickly to get differences of approach. As soon as we begin to argue about raising the school leaving age, many people will say, "It is not worth while for so-and-so to be kept at school an extra year," but, by and large, we do not find well-to-do parents in the community discussing whether it is worth while to keep a child at school for a year or two or three years beyond the statutory school leaving age. It is taken as normal that those with a reasonable level of income provide their children with that extended education. That is what I mean when I say that we should not regard it simply as a platitude that children ought to be looked at as being of equal worth.
The other case for equality of opportunity is the case which my right hon. Friend was advancing in his opening speech. It is tremendously important—indeed, it may be vital to our survival as a nation—that we give the community access to the potential ability of all of its children. The greatest wealth in this country today is the potential skill of our children, whether it be skill lying in their brains or in their hands. We must do all we can to develop that skill and to make it available to the community but, as we all know, there is still far too great a degree of wastage of that skill.
It has been calculated by most of the expert committees who have considered this matter that, for instance, we could double the number of children in Scotland who pass the higher leaving certificate each year. We could get a substantial increase in the educated manpower of the community if we could avoid some of this wastage. I submit that some of the wastage is still due to the class barriers remaining in education. They still stultify and strangle the educational opportunity of our children.
Let me give one example. In Scotland we are proud of our educational tradition. We are proud of the fact that our desire for equality of opportunity in Scotland goes back a long time before it began to exist in England in the same way. It goes back to the time of John Knox.
In passing, I must confess that I felt that an appropriate title for the speeches of the hon. Gentlemen opposite might be that of John Knox's famous pamphlet "A Trumpet Blast against the Monstrous Regiment of Women." But that is by the way. The point I am making is that our educational tradition is a very old one.
But alas, in some respects, nowadays we are lagging behind England. I do not think it is generally appreciated in Scotland that in the Education Acts of 1944 and 1945, whereas England completely abolished fees for all State education, we in Scotland did not do so. We left this to the discretion of the local authorities. The Secretary of State has argued with me across the Table at Question Time that this is admirable, that this is the kind of discretion that we should leave to the local authorities.
I submit that the question of whether there is an entrance fee into schools, the question of whether entry into a school shall be decided on the income of the parent rather than on the ability of the child, is not a matter that can be left to the discretion of the local authorities. It is a matter of national principle in education, just as much as the setting of the age at which one enters or leaves school. It promotes rather stupid, petty and rather senseless snobberies. So many parents feel that they are buying their children's education. But of course they are not buying it; they are only paying an entrance fee into the school. It is only a small percentage of the cost of the education.
I have looked up the figures for Dundee High School, a school of great distinction, in my constituency. The parents, who make great sacrifices to send their children there, pay only two-fifths of the cost of the education of their children. It would be a notable advance if in Scotland we were to take the step of abolishing fees for State education. I do not expect this proposition to be sympathetically received by the Front Bench opposite, because there is a difference of outlook here between the two sides of the House, but it is important to recognise that if we are to seek real equality of opportunity, we shall not have it until that kind of barrier is removed.
I am not suggesting that its removal by itself would make any great advance towards real equality; it is very easy to


overstate its importance. The difficulties that lie in the way are greater and more fundamental than that. The Registrar-General, in his various censuses, provides a social scale by which we can measure the status of people in the community. In 1947 a Scottish mental survey was taken and has been widely quoted in educational circles outside Scotland.
The Scottish mental survey measured the intelligence of children in relation to their place on the Registrar-General's social scale and it discovered that of the most intelligent children, two-thirds came from working-class families. But when looking at the universities today, despite the very great progress we have made in opening their doors and making our universities more accessible to ability, we still find that only about one-fifth of the children come from working class homes. This is a measure of the kind of discrepancy that we must work to correct. It is a long-term aim but it is important to recognise the extent of the gap which still exists.
Much of the discrepancy is due to inherent obstacles in the social conditions of our own community. The problems of society cannot be solved in the schools—the two interact upon each other; but especially when the Government are deciding, as they are at present, economic policy issues it is important to recognise this interaction between the general social conditions and the chance for children to have real equality of opportunity.
I do not think that what is needed today is another Education Act. It would be much more to the point if, for instance, we could provide more equal housing conditions. As we all know, the child from a fairly comfortable home, with books around him and whose family is familiar with habits of learning, finds it much easier to get on in school, especially as the years go by, than the child who comes from a room and kitchen and has to do homework in an overcrowded slum.
Therefore, I warn the Government that their policy of raising council rents, for instance, is an act of educational policy that may well prevent many working class children who have the necessary ability from getting on to the fifth or sixth year at the secondary school. Many parents who live in a room and kitchen may be offered council houses, but when

the subsidy is slashed the rent will be too high for them and they must decide that they cannot afford the decent living conditions. Consequently, they remain where they are and the children leave school at the age of 15 or 16 instead of going on. It is important to recognise this close relationship which exists between general social policy and our chances of really making available to the community the potential ability of its children.
In passing, and going from the general to the particular, I hope that one piece of alleviation of the problem of housing conditions in relation to children of ability will be the provision of homework facilities for children by opening the schools and persuading some of the teachers to come back after school hours. This would provide preparation facilities for children whose home conditions do not permit of their doing homework.
I have been speaking mainly of the need to allow working class children of ability to get on to university level. In this connection, I wish to make one point about university facilities in Scotland. Recently, the House dealt with a Bill reorganising St. Andrews University, a matter which interests me because part of the university lies within my constituency. I am very keen indeed to see university education flourish in the city of Dundee, but the problem of St. Andrews University is more than anything else a problem of an adequate supply of students.
Both Edinburgh and Glasgow Universities are crowded, whereas St. Andrews University, in both St. Andrews and Dundee, lacks sufficient students. The lectures in Glasgow University are practically public meetings. One gets the situation where, in the words of the old phrase, the lectures pass from the notebook of the lecturer to the notebooks of the students without going through the mind of either. That is the situation in a mass university like Glasgow or Edinburgh. It would be much more sensible in the Scottish national interest if there was an attempt at planning the distribution of university students. This necessitates enrolling the co-operation of local education authorities and persuading them to give grants to send children to universities other than those on their doorsteps. We all understand the


motives of local patriotism which are involved and also the financial considerations, because sometimes more money would be needed to send a child away from home. I think, however, it is worth spending the money to make the fullest use of our university facilities; and it is also a good thing in university education for young people to be away from home a bit and to enjoy the corporate life of a university away from their own homes. I commend that suggestion to the Secretary of State.
I have dealt mainly with the problem of allowing working class children to reach university or professional level when their abilities entitle them to that kind of education. But that is only a small part of the educational problem that faces us and it is only a small part of the problem of allowing children to develop their own potentialities and of allowing the community to use their services.
It is also very important that we should expand the kind of educational work that I was most interested to hear described by the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland. It is desirable more and more to link education for the non-academic child with the kind of work that the child will do, in order to afford a real interest and impact between the two. I am keenly interested in the Dundee Trades College and am glad that the Secretary of State recently announced that a new building would be provided.
I remember visiting the college and being told by one of the teachers that what impressed him about teaching was that the boys who came, often after a final year at school, where they had been bored and fed up, were reluctant to come back into a classroom, but that once they got there they found that the kind of work they did was exciting; as they discovered the work of learning was adventurous, they became very keen. With some children, I was told, there are only two occasions in their educational life when they are really happy at school; this was an exaggeration, but it makes my point. The first occasion is when they are in the nursery school, and the second is when they go into the pre-apprentice school. Certainly, there is a tremendous field for experiment in the pre-apprenticeship trade schools, and I hope that we will extend them as fully as we can.
If we attempted to establish an educational system in which children could develop their own potentialities, we would be faced acutely with the problem of the framework of that education. If children are to get an education according to their capabilities, there is a real danger of the children becoming segregated according to their capabilities. In place of the problems of class structure which I have been pointing out, there would be the equal dangers of intellectual segregation, intellectual snobbery and that sort of thing. It is for that reason that on this side of the House we are especially interested in experimenting with comprehensive schools.
There are, of course, already a number of comprehensive schools in Scotland. I myself attended one during my own school days. But in the kind of social democratic society which we want to build, and on the basis of which exists Britain's only chance of survival, we have to have a school system which provides a common school life for our children. It will be a system in which according to their different abilities they can mix together and get to know each other and respect different qualities, so that they may no longer feel that someone who works with his jacket off and in his braces is inferior to a person who sits at a desk and answers a telephone. That is the basic problem which we have to face. It is long-term, but it is a problem that will never be worked out except within the terms of Government educational policies.

5.22 p.m.

Mr. Douglas L. S. Nairn: I shall be briefer than I might have been, because a great deal of what I want to say has been said by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Renfrew, East (Sir G. Lloyd) and my hon. Friend the Member for Scotstoun (Mr. G. R. H. Hutchison). The problem which faces us is so important that too much emphasis cannot be laid upon it. That problem can be expressed in one sentence: School teaching today is not attracting into its ranks either sufficient men or men with the necessary qualifications and character as it did in the past, and those men of high qualifications and character who entered it in past years today are disturbed and fearful of what the future may hold for them.
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State may be able to produce statistics which would show, or tend to show, that that is not correct. But statistics can give a very false impression, especially when they are drawn from figures which must be a year old and when related to the future. All of us who have gone into this question will know that my statement of the problem which faces us is in no way exaggerated.
As has been said already, this does not apply to women. To them teaching is as attractive a profession as ever and is getting in its ranks women of the highest quality and qualifications. And the implementation of the principle of equal pay has done a great deal to encourage them. But we would be shutting our eyes to the true situation if we failed to note that the implementation of equal pay has greatly disturbed many of the male teachers. That is not because they are jealous of their women partners in education. They fully appreciate the great part that women teachers play. It is because they fear that the implementation of that principle has pushed almost beyond the horizon any possibility of their getting an increase in their salary which would enable them not only to take their rightful place in the community, but would ensure the constant flow of the right men into the profession.
I have said that in present conditions teaching is an attractive proposition for women, but I ask them, if the implementation of equal pay should in the future lead to fewer schoolmasters, or less efficient schoolmasters, would they then like to contemplate the task of keeping order and discipline in a school which had amongst its pupils—as it always must—unruly and sometimes truculent and always high-spirited boys, if beside them they did not have good men to command discipline and respect among the male pupils?

Miss Herbison: I wonder from where the hon. Member is getting his information. Is it not well known that many women are teaching in Scotland who would have no more difficulty, indeed sometimes less difficulty, in keeping discipline, even among boys of 17, than have some of the men?

Mr. Nairn: That is a question which I should like the hon. Member to put to the parents of Scotland. It is a

psychological question. How many fathers or mothers would like to feel that their sons were being brought up entirely under the direction of women? During a boy's life there conies a time when it is bad for him to remain too long under too much feminine influence. There comes a time when his life must be dominated, at least for a period, by men rather than by women.

Mr. Bence: Does the hon. Member seriously suggest to family men that if their children go to school and are taught for six hours a day by school teachers that teaching will dominate even over the influence of the parent at home? If that is not being afraid of parenthood and an abnegation of parenthood, I do not know what is. I do not care how many teachers teach my kiddy, they will not influence him.

Mr. Nairn: The hon. Member should ask the parents of Scotland whether or not they would mind having their sons taught entirely by women.
I am not prepared tonight to put forward a reasoned solution to the problem, but it is a problem we have to solve. At present a male honours graduate after ten years' service will be getting £800 a year and a non-graduate £665. Had he gone into industry after ten years he could well expect to be getting between £1,000 and £1,800. That has been very forcibly expressed in the Appleton Report. We all know of men whose desire and ambition has been to enter school teaching but who have been unable to resist the attraction of tempting offers in other walks of life. The difference in remuneration between schoolmastering and industry is just too great and the prospects for marriage with all its responsibilities is just to meagre.
I should like to make one suggestion. At present schoolmasters have their teaching certificates withdrawn when they are 60. In this House we realise that, while once upon a time it may have been wise to withdraw certificates at the age of 60, today most men are only at their best at the age of 60. I suggest that the Secretary of State consider whether withdrawal of teaching certificates at the age of 60 could not immediately be revoked. There are also strong arguments—and here I refer to school teachers of both sexes—for allowing school teachers, when


re-employed in their own profession, to earn full salaries for the job, without any deduction from pension.
There was a very encouraging announcement in the papers today. It is that various firms have formed a trust and have already got a guarantee of £1,500,000 for technical education. "The Times" today, after congratulating them on initiative, says in its leading article:
It is made clear that the fund is for building and equipping science departments.…
Later in the article it goes on to say:
Good teachers have always been more important than good buildings.…
These private firms have given us this great inspiration and encouragement by doing their part in providing buildings. I hope that we in Scotland will now do our part by making sure that we provide the good schoolmasters to carry on the work in these buildings they provide.

5.30 p.m.

Mr. James Carmichael: Three hon. Members who have spoken from the Government benches argued about male teachers against women teachers. I do not propose to enter into that controversy. In my view, the question in the speech of the hon. and gallant Member for Renfrew, East (Sir G. Lloyd), the idea of getting some administrative alteration, could easily solve this aspect of teaching.
The point I wish to debate is that of children going to school. From the reports I have read, including the one issued by the Scottish Office, apart altogether from the salaries of teachers, there is a crisis among the children. It is admitted in the Report on Education in a paragraph associated with junior elementary schools:
In some schools the general level of attainment has been high, in others disappointingly low, in many reasonably satisfactory.
Those are very vague words—"in many reasonably satisfactory."
On the whole standards may be said to be slowly improving.
I come to the most important point, which was dealt with even in the Budget speech:
Among material factors which affect progress in varying degrees, accommodation and equipment both suffer from serious deficiencies

which call for remedy. Staffing constitutes a still more serious problem.
I wish to deal especially with the primary schools and the junior secondary schools. I represent an area where there must be at least twelve schools that are almost a hundred years old—they are slum schools.

ROYAL ASSENT

5.32 p.m.

Message to attend the Lords Commissioners.

The House went, and, having returned—

Mr. SPEAKER reported the Royal Assent to:

1. Sudan (Special Payments) Act, 1955,
2. Validation of Elections (No. 2) Act, 1955.

EDUCATION, SCOTLAND

Question again proposed, That this House do now adjourn.

5.44 p.m.

Mr. Carmichael: When the House was interrupted by Black Rod, I was dealing with slum schools in Glasgow. Many of them are almost 100 years old. That is admitted by the education authority of Glasgow. I would like to reinforce the claim made by the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) by reading something that was said by the Director of Education of Glasgow in his progress report. He said:
There are few schools in the built-up parts of the city that do not require attention in some important respect; many are urgently in need of major reconstruction and a substantial number are completely obsolete and quite unsuited to meet present-day requirements. Many of these schools are situated in congested areas on very restricted sites with limited or no playground space, inadequate and unsatisfactory cloakroom, washing and lavatory facilities, poor ventilation and heating, no place where children can assemble as a school, and staff-room conditions quite unworthy of the teaching profession. There is great need for a progressive and systematic scheme of reconstruction of the older schools in the city.
Having read the report issued a few days ago by the Chancellor and the Secretary of State, I see no possibility of any change in the condition of those schools. Conditions are much more severe for the children, because they are living in overcrowded slum dwellings and have to go


to schools where there is no possibility of their getting decent facilities because the schools are also overcrowded. In many of the primary schools of Glasgow classes range from 40 to 54 pupils. It is obvious that a teacher must be very painstaking in those circumstances.
Many of these schools have sound exteriors, although the classrooms are the same as they were more than 60 years ago. The school to which I went in Bridgeton has a very sound exterior, but the classrooms are just as they were when I was a boy. It should be possible for the Education Department of Scotland to make a study of the schools which are being built in the new towns, and try to reconstruct classrooms in the congested areas on similar lines. The desks in the old schools are just the same as they were when I was a boy. In the new town of East Kilbride one will find a perfect school. If a little effort were made there could he some reconstruction of the schools in these slum areas.
I admire the teachers in these slum schools, who, although they do their work with great enthusiasm, are bound to be dissatisfied with their lives because of the depressing conditions in which they have to work. The problem of their salaries could easily be adjusted if the Government adopted a more generous attitude, in view of the job which these teachers do.
My hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, East (Mr. G. Thomson) referred to the problem of the fee-paying schools. In political warfare it is often said that hon. Members on this side are the people who are associated with class antagonism. Take it from me—the fee-paying school is a school of snobbery. In 1941 Glasgow Corporation decided to abolish fee-paying schools. It went to the then Secretary of State for Scotland—I do not require to mention his name—and he refused to agree to the corporation's proposal. Many of the people who go to fee-paying schools in Glasgow come from outwith the city. The amount of money they pay in fees meets less than three months of their education.
It is strange that an ordinary child in Bridgeton has no chance of getting into Kelvinside Academy while the child of a person who happens to be in a profession,

although he is outside the city, can be taken there to be educated. I have been at Kelvinside Academy, Glasgow High School and the Glasgow Academy when the pupils have been going in. I have watched the fathers coming up with their cars, taking their sons to school. I never yet saw a miner taking his child to Kelvinside Academy or a shipbuilding labourer taking his child there in a motor car, or a street sweeper in Glasgow taking his child to the Glasgow Academy. Despite all the legislation we have had upon education, there seems no possibility even today or for generations to come for the miner, shipbuilding worker or street sweeper to send their sons to those fee-paying schools.
If we want a properly educated community, every child born in this land is entitled to the same opportunity, but the people of the East End of Glasgow, in Gorbals or Maryhill, are denied that opportunity from the day they are born. Hillhead High School has to advertise for pupils although some of the primary schools in the East End of Glasgow are on short time because of overcrowding. Sound education gives a child a good background. He must become a member of the community and play his part whatever his profession. Likewise, he must be an individual with his own characteristics. Therefore, I say that the whole system of education has a class bias because people without wealth are denied the right to give their children a decent education.
Who built the engineering shops, and even the schools? I do not mind professional people like lawyers, doctors and technicians giving their children the best education they can get. They are entitled to it, but they have no right to close the door to the children of the shipyard workers and the miners. Hopes are a bit blighted in this direction because of the tone of the recent Budget, and the possibilities are somewhat remote. I hope that in some Parliament and some local authority the opportunity will arise so that a child born in the East End of Glasgow or any other East End will have the same opportunity of education and of making his talents suitable to the community while retaining his own individuality.

5.55 p.m.

Colonel Alan Gomme-Duncan: Following the hon. Member for Bridgeton (Mr. Carmichael) and the hon. Member for Dundee East (Mr. G. M. Thomson), I can safely say that every hon. Member agrees that the widening of educational opportunity for children of all classes is an aim and object worthy of the highest effort, The methods will be disputed, but the principle is accepted by us all.
I heard a rumour and saw it mentioned in a newspaper—I forget which newspaper—that it is proposed to raise the compulsory school-leaving age to 16. Without qualification, that would be a disaster. This does not mean that I think there are not children in our schools well worth keeping at school until they are 16. There are, and they should have the opportunity. When we raised the school-leaving age to 15 the principle was sound, but the way in which it was done was deplorable and has led to many troubles since in the educational world.
I do not profess to be an expert in this matter, but I think we must find a method whereby those for whom it will be worth while contributing the country's money on education for a further year should have the opportunity and should be given every possible chance, while those who cannot benefit from further education of that type should not clutter up our schools and increase the size of classes, and so on.

Mr. G. M. Thomson: I am most interested in what the hon. and gallant Member is saying. Would he apply the same principle to the great independent public schools of the country?

Colonel Gomme-Duncan: Having been removed from public school at 15 because I was considered to be not making any progress, I can say "Yes."

Mr. E. G. Willis: Removed by the Government?

Colonel Gomme-Duncan: I was removed by my governor, and that was much more terrifying. Fathers in those days were fathers, believe me. I do not want it to be thought that I am against the widening of educational opportunity, but a cut-and-dried order that everybody is to stay at school is not the best way to do it. without careful preparation

beforehand. I will not go further than that.
I want to mention what I still believe to be an unhappy feature in education, and that is the bias against agriculture. Many children, many parents and many teachers think that there is something superior about being in a garage, or having something to do with electricity, to working on the land. That is a great pity, and is a tendency that ought to be countered and discouraged whenever possible. The agricultural worker can be as great an expert as any shipbuilder; what is more, the shipyard worker depends upon him for livelihood. Anything which tends to make children and their parents think there is something derogatory about going on the land must be countered by any means in our power. I hope that people in all walks of life, particularly in towns, will recognise this as a very dangerous trend which ought to be stopped.
I am not at all satisfied with the teaching of Scottish history. I was talking to an educated woman the other day—she is supposed to be educated, but it is always rather doubtful what that term means—and she said, "Oh, but English history is so much longer than Scottish history." That struck me as being at about the bottom level of stupidity, but it was an attitude of mind not, I suppose, confined to that particular woman. I am not satisfied that in Scottish schools Scottish history is being sufficiently gone into. We have a great and wonderful history and, up to the time of the Act of Union, the two histories should be taught separately. We have, of course, the person who says, "When I talk about England I include Scotland," but one does not get very far with that in history.
I hope that Scottish history will, quite automatically, be made an item of the curriculum in Scottish schools. No Scottish child should be brought up without a grounding in the history of his or her country. It is, after all, a very creditable one, with a few discreditable incidents.

6.1 p.m.

Mr. Malcolm MacPherson: I have a few points which have been brought to my notice by constituents. First, there is a group of pensioners who left the teaching profession before 1945, and these people are suffering badly now from the decline in


the value of money. The ten years of fairly steady inflation since the war have put them in an extremely difficult position, and I would ask the Government to pay some attention to them as an individual class. They do need a little more help.
I have also had a number of representations on equal pay. All the arguments that have been advanced against equal pay by the men's side of the profession seem to be predicated on the assumption that teachers' salaries will, in any case, remain extremely low. If teachers' salaries were all not at their present level, but at that of their contemporaries at the universities who are now in other callings, I do not think that that argument would have any validity at all. It starts from the assumption that teachers' salaries will remain extremely small, so the real substance of the case is a hidden plea for better salaries all round. There is no doubt that if those salaries were made comparable to those paid in other professions, a good deal of the complaint would be removed from the minds of men teachers.
I have had a number of letters about the new scale of salaries in further education. I welcome the establishment of a scale—it is an extremely good thing—but there have proved to be a number of anomalies in the scale suggested. As every one of my correspondents say "I have sent this statement to the Secretary of State giving all the details," the hon. Gentleman will be fully aware of them and I shall not, therefore, pursue it further.
Had there been less pressure on the time at our disposal—and had I, myself, not felt that I should repay the brevity which has been shown by more brevity on my own part—I should have liked to have commented more fully on the Appleton Report. One of the recommendations of that Report was the deferment of the National Service of scientists who were willing to teach in the schools. I am sorry that the Secretary of State took so long to make up his mind on that, but I am glad that he did make the decision eventually.
There is, however, one thing that shakes me to the core—and it is something to lay not at the door of the Joint Under-Secretary but at that of some of his colleagues. The high-powered Appleton Committee

made this recommendation without thinking it even necessary to call representatives of the Service Ministries before it to ask what these men were doing while in the Services. In itself, that is an extraordinary reflection on the attitude which an intelligent section of the public adopts to what is happening to people going into the Forces.
Furthermore, since the recommendation was made, and accepted, no evidence whatever has been produced, and no attempt made to produce it, that so far the Services have been using those men well and will miss them. I do not think that they have been using the men well, and it will be good if, as a result of that recommendation and the policy following it, they go into the schools. That is, perhaps, a side-issue, but it is the sort of issue one cannot evade when discussing education. So much of educational policy depends on the availability of the kind of manpower we want.
Even if the new policy, based on the recommendations of the Appleton Committee, brings more scientists into the schools there will be a good deal still to do. In particular, we need to adopt the policy outlined by my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, East (Mr. G. M. Thomson)—it has, of course, been put forward in earlier debates—of increasing the number of students who stay on at school. But this point arises there. People assume that because, to use my hon. Friend's phrase, we are to double the number of people having school-leaving certificates we will double the pool from which we can draw staff for the schools. By hypothesis, those who will stay on at school after 15 years of age are the intelligent people who, when nowadays they go into industry, are promoted to the executive positions and, in time, run industry.
I hope that we shall not assume that industry, losing these recruits at 15, will simply say "Goodbye" to them. Of course it will not. That increased pool of those of higher intelligence will be increasingly raided by industry at a later stage; otherwise, industry would not have the intelligence in its ranks to run its own show. While I am all in favour of the policy—and one good thing will be that it will increase the supply of teachers—it must be realised that nothing like all of those going on to higher education will be recruits for the schools.
Judging by the lines on which industry is now running we shall indeed be lucky if we get from the new pool as many as we did from the old.
One hon. Member opposite mentioned this morning's news about an industrial fund being raised for the teaching of science. I welcome that. I think it is a very good thing. But I notice, also, one or two other points about it. For a long time some of the larger and more progressive industrial firms have shown a great interest in this question of the maintenance of a continuing supply of science teachers. In many cases they have taken a greater and more intelligent interest in this question than have the teachers' organisations themselves. I am very glad that they are doing something practical in the matter.
My hon. Friends the Members for Dundee, East, and for Bridgeton (Mr. Carmichael) have referred to the different types of schools which cater for different sections of the population. The fund to which I have referred is restricted entirely to public schools and direct grant schools. It is fortunate that we have this fund and that science teaching should be encouraged, but it is to be noted that of the small proportion of science graduates who now decide to teach the great majority are attracted to the public schools and to the direct grant schools.
This will merely increase the attraction of this type of school for these people and, unless modifying influences set in, will therefore tend to increase the difference, educationally more than socially perhaps, between these different types of schools. A profession of this sort evidently has its disadvantages as well as its advantages. The advantage is obvious—£1,500,000 to improve science teaching. But there are difficulties as well.
I am sorry that what I have said has been so scrappy. I should have preferred to have prepared a lengthy oration with a massive train of thought running through it and reaching a final conclusion, but I was not in a position to do that, and I hope I have not detained the House too long.

6.12 p.m.

Mr. C. N. Thornton-Kemsley: Before I come to my main theme, may I, as one representing

a rural area in Angus and the Mearns, say how much we have appreciated again the availability of the schoolchildren in gathering the potato harvest. I say that because we really do appreciate it and because it is clear that without the help of children we could not possibly have got in the potato harvest. It is obvious that we shall need them again until we can find the kind of machine which will gather in the potatoes and reject the stones. I hope that we shall find that machine soon.
I was talking to several schoolmasters on this subject during the Recess. I was on the land with the potato gatherers, and I met one schoolmaster who said to me, "It is no good denying that the potato holidays upset our educational programme, but as against that I like to set this factor: after the potato holidays are over, the children come back with new wellington boots and mackintoshes, better shod and better clad to face the inclement weather of the winter than they would have done if there had not been that additional money going into the homes." Those were the words of a schoolmaster of a large school. He said that in nearly every case, in the decent homes, the money that goes to the families is spent upon the children. I was very glad to hear that.
In the old days before we were so centralised, we used to arrange with the local schools when they should close. There was a complete local option about it. Now we have centralised everything and we have to have the same holidays over the whole of Scotland. This year the potato holidays were arranged for a certain date and then, because of the weather, they had to be put forward by a week. That leads to considerable losses and great difficulty, no doubt for the schools but also for the farmers.
I cannot see why we should not get back to a certain degree of local option by counties. It cannot be expected that the potatoes will be ready to be gathered in Midlothian at the same time as they are in Kincardine or Angus. I cannot see why we should not allow the county education committees, in consultation with the local farmers, through their organised channels, to decide by counties when the holidays should be. I believe that a committee has been set up to look into all the aspects of this question of


school labour for the potato harvest, and I hope that this committee will give attention to this matter of potato holidays.

Miss Herbison: Since the hon. Gentleman is so loud in his praise of potato gathering and the fine influences that come from it, may I ask whether he has tried to use his influence in any way so that pupils in the great public schools and in our select secondary schools may have the benefits which he evidently thinks flow from potato gathering?

Mr. Ross: Including wellington boots.

Mr. Thornton-Kemsley: Yes, perhaps that subject will be considered by the Appleton Committee.
My time is limited and I wish to deal with one aspect of the shortage of teachers which is of so much concern to us all. The staff position in Scotland is better than it was before the war. Comparing 1954 with 1939, and despite the increase in the school-leaving age, the number of pupils in our Scottish schools has increased by 8 per cent. while the number of teachers has increased by 11 per cent. Moreover, there are more teachers entering the training colleges—25 per cent. to 30 per cent. more than there were before the war—which is the more remarkable since the age groups from which the teachers are drawn are lower than they were between the wars. Nevertheless, in spite of these facts, not sufficient teachers are coming forward to teach in our Scottish schools.
This is especially the case with the specialist teachers of mathematics and science in our secondary schools where, we are told, the shortage is likely to reach about 600 by 1961, and where by 1957 recruitment, if it goes on at the present rate, will total only 30 per annum as against an annual wastage of 50. This is a very serious situation, because in the scientific revolution in which we in these islands are playing a leading part it is essential that if we are to stay in the forefront we should have the teachers and the facilities to train the engineers and the scientists to handle the new machines in the electronic factories of the future.
Many references have been made, as one would expect, to the findings of the Appleton Committee. The Report of the Committee analysed the causes of those shortages, and one of the reasons it gave

was the competing demands for mathematicians and scientists in industry. In conditions of full employment the young graduates seem to prefer research to teaching.
The Report makes certain recommendations. Some of them require Government action and, together with the hon. Member for Stirling and Falkirk Burghs (Mr. Malcolm MacPherson), although perhaps with more enthusiasm than he showed, I welcome the answer given on the last day before the Recess to my right hon. Friend the Member for Kelvin-grove (Mr. Elliot), who was told by the Minister of Labour and National Service that favourable consideration would be given to the indefinite deferment from National Service of first and second class honours graduates in science and mathematics who intended to take up teaching. Other recommendations of the Committee require action and study by the universities, and I want to ask my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary whether he has any information to give the House about those aspects of the Report.
In the old days we used to speak about the three R's of education—reading, writing and arithmetic. I am sure that we shall have done much to solve the problem of the shortage of teachers, not only among specialist teachers of mathematics and science, when we have given proper attention to the three S's—salaries, superannuation and status.
Many of my hon. Friends have spoken about salaries this afternoon, including my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Renfrew, East (Sir G. Lloyd), my hon. Friend the Member for Scotstoun (Mr. J. R. H. Hutchison) and my hon. Friend the Member for Central Ayrshire (Mr. Nairn), and I do not want to add to what they have said. There is much which could be said on superannuation, but perhaps we are wiser to defer our comments until we have seen the Government's proposals in the Teachers (Superannuation) Bill, which we all await with interest and which some of us await with anxiety.
There is one comment about superannuation which I want to make before passing to the question of status. I want to urge that in that legislation, or administratively as soon as possible, arrangements should be made to pay the superannuation of retired teachers by monthly instead of


quarterly instalments. I have been trying for years to get this done and I am getting rather tired of the excuses which are always made. It is said that it would require a large increase in the Paymaster-General's staff and that there would be an additional charge in the year of the change-over. I find it difficult to believe that a Government Department cannot devise methods for making monthly instead of quarterly payments of pensions without having a large increase in staff.
Dealing with the other excuse, it is true that more will have to be paid to teachers in the twelve months of the change-over. I am told that in Scotland it is no more than £1½ million. Of course, it is only an accounting matter which would be made up in due course. In my view it cannot be a valid reason for rejecting a humanitarian plea. In many cases the gap of three months is causing distress, and I know from my own personal contacts that there are real difficulties. For my part, I shall not cease to urge that the administrative change should be made as soon as possible, for it means so much to many who deserve so greatly of all of us.
On the question of status, the right hon. Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) spoke wisely about the great honour it is to be a teacher. We all remember examples of the Scottish dominie who was so greatly respected as a leader of the local community. We can think of women teachers in the Sunday schools, leaders of the W.R.I. and of the girl guides. When this sort of leadership happens, it happens because these men and women have attained positions of respect and leadership through their wide range of interests and because they are willing to take a lead in public and local affairs.
This may be regarded as a small point, but I think it is important: I should like to see more of the honours for public service going to school teachers—such honours as the B.E.M. and the M.B.E. I should like to see men and women school teachers named in every honours list. It would do something to let them see that their status is important and that they are respected throughout the land.
I join with my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Renfrew, East in saying that teachers ought to have more say in the formation of policy. I know it is a

difficult question and that they would have to have locally elected representatives beside them, but I should like to see arrangements made whereby the local education authority could co-opt to its education committees advisers from the teaching profession who would sit in as assessors and advisers without having voting rights.
As one of the long-term remedies for making good the shortage of school teachers, the Appleton Committee noted with satisfaction the increase in the number of bursaries made possible by the education authorities under the Bursaries Regulations of 1953. Many of us, on both sides of the House, were privileged during the summer to meet representatives of the Scottish Union of Students who discussed with us the final form of Amendment No. 1, 1955, to those Regulations, which is about to be promulgated.
When we consider students' grants, two questions come to mind: first of all, are the grants themselves sufficient to prevent individual cases of hardship—and the students told us that they were not sufficient in all cases and, secondly, are the grants fair when compared with those in England and Wales—and the students say that they are not. We were informed that Scottish students who are entirely dependent upon grants will each receive £65 a year less than their English counterparts if they live at home and £90 less if they live away from home. I want to ask my hon. Friend whether that is so and, if it is, why it should be so.
The Regulations, which many of us have studied, are a great improvement upon the original draft. They are an improvement, for example, because the level of parents' incomes above which contributions are required from parents has been raised. Moreover, I am informed that the Scottish Education Department, in its Circular 313, urges local education authorities to give individual consideration in deciding upon allowances for books and materials and deciding upon vacational allowances. I believe that few in this House would disagree with the Circular, which says
It is highly desirable that students should be free to devote to reading and study a reasonable proportion of the vacation…and that they should also have time for relaxation.
There has been, some would think advisedly, a great deal of discretion allowed to local authorities in these


matters, but that local discretion has given rise to a considerable lack of uniformity. I think we must watch the application of discretion very closely indeed. It may be necessary to press for an advisory committee to advise upon the distribution of these student grants. That may not be necessary but, on the other hand, unless we can get something like uniformity and fair dealing as between one authority and another, it may be advisable for us to press for an advisory committee of that kind. We have to consider this item, this one facet of the problem, in its relation to the paramount need for an adequate supply of graduates both for industry and, as is our particular concern today, for the teaching profession.

6.32 p.m.

Mr. William Ross: We are discussing today the Scottish Education Report. I think it would be rather a waste of time for me to use the very short time at my disposal to go into questions of salary, students' grants and other things which are still to come before the House in the form of regulations. I think it is symptomatic of the state of affairs in the teaching profession that we have this controversy over salaries and division of opinion regarding the merits of equal pay coming particularly from hon. Members opposite. The Government had better face the fact that there never was a time when there was more disgruntlement and frustration in the teaching profession than at present.
What we should be concerned about is the effect that that will have on education and on the recruitment of teachers. We all know how short we are of teachers. There is the question of shortage of teachers and conditions of employment. Not only are the children affected by overcrowded classes, but the effect on the teacher trying to do his best under those conditions is such that it leads to frustration. There is the question of salaries and status. May I say to the hon. Member for North Angus and Mearns (Mr. Thornton-Kemsley) that if he offered the teacher today, in recognition of the status of his profession, an increase of salary or an M.B.E. the teacher would take the increase in salary. That would certainly be much more of an incentive to recruitment than the M.B.E.
There is the question of technical education. We are short of teachers everywhere for technical education, not only of men teachers but women teachers. The only thing on which we could agree with the hon. Member is that he was the only hon. Member opposite who had a good word to say about women teachers. What women teachers will think about the remarks of the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Mr. Nairn) I do not know, but I can see his majority of 167 already melting because of the speech he made today.
When teachers see what happens to retired members of the profession who want an increase in superannuation they are not given any confidence in the Government. The crux of the matter is that if the salaries to which women are being raised by equal pay were adequate and in keeping with those paid in other professions there would be no controversy over equal pay. I regret very much, considering the effect that has on recruitment and also on the state of mind of existing male teachers, that the Government dealt so quickly with the suggestions put forward by the E.I.S. on salaries.
What is to be the effect of the recent White Paper on buildings? We have been told that education authorities are to keep their capital estimates down to what they were last year and even new works already authorised cannot begin unless there is special need and urgency.
Take the position of Kilmarnock. I asked a Question some time ago and the Joint Under Secretary of State told me that he had had no complaints about Kilmarnock. If I were given to unparliamentary language, there is one short word I could use in response. The fact is that the education committee for Ayrshire saw the Department in the summer and set up a special working committee to speed up what was required in Ayrshire. In the county we require 33 new schools and seven extensions. On the basis of the progress of last year it will take fifteen to twenty years to get that development. The people concerned in administration have no idea of what will be the outcome of that programme—not the ultimate completion, but what is to happen next year to that programme—in view of the recent announcements by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Secretary of State.
In Kilmarnock, we have a new housing area and children have to travel right across to the other side of the town to be educated. The Government have failed properly to plan educational development with housing development. In Shortlees, Kilmarnock, we built a school but in five years there has been no educational development and that school is already overcrowded. There is continuing discontent among the people of Kilmarnock and elsewhere at the inadequacy of school buildings, while in another part of Ayrshire there is the frustration of having a new school with 14 teachers only five of whom are qualified. Is that not a shocking position? There is nothing to be proud of in that.
I am certain that the Scottish Education Department knows the problem and is willing, as far as it can, to get on with it and to get on with the greater problem—the whole question of educational progress and development in Scotland. It cannot do so because it is bogged down with the shortage of teachers, the controversy over salaries, the question of qualification, the over-sized classes, and so on. There are fewer in the secondary schools this year because there are more in the primary schools. The Department cannot get on to the actual question which should be concerning Scottish education at present.
This is high-lighted by the fact that of 72,860 leavers from the secondary schools—50,281 on the three-year course—only 43 per cent. completed their three-year course. That educational potential is being wasted. If we take the five-year course we find that of 22,579 who left last year only 6,174 embarked on the course offered. This is the course for which there is so much competition and dividing up and segregation of pupils, and in which 73 per cent. of the people who started to get into this competition for places wasted their opportunity.
I am not going into the reasons for that, because I have not got the time, but these are the things we should properly be discussing, and half a day s not nearly enough time in which to discuss them. On the basis of what is happening and of the schooling that we need, we ought to be developing our educational system today.
The administration is so beset with physical and material problems that it never gets down to relating education as such to the changing world—to the world of nuclear and scientific advance and of automation. Obviously, given the right type of administration here and the right kind of leadership throughout the world, we shall have far more leisure. I do not believe that schools and education exist merely for turning out either skilled or unskilled craftsmen. We need to judge schools not by the number of teachers that are turned out, not by the number of geniuses or the number of dunces. I would rather say that they should be judged more by the number of social misfits and the number of "Teddy boys" than anything else.
To my mind, there is no dual purpose in education. The soul and centre of education is the child itself, and its future life in the sense of its work in the community, not just as an individual making a living, but also in the greatly extended sense of living in leisure in its own time and with the ability to use it. I think we should be developing and making the best of our junior secondary schools. I have not the time to go into all the difficulties there, but this is still the Cinderella, though it is still the main hope of Scottish education. The development of the junior secondary schools, since we have got the chance, is the main hope of getting a really comprehensive secondary school system.
Scotland has a great tradition for education, a tradition which is not entirely justified. It was a tradition of the 5 per cent. of scholastic achievement possible, but of the 95 per cent. who were forgotten, who left school in the old days at the ages of 12 and 13 and now leave at 15, we should not be quite so proud. We are in danger today of getting into an educational backwater, and I urge the Government to awake to the fact and to put forward proposals which will make us lead once again in the world of education.

6.43 p.m.

Mr. William Hannan: It is indicative of the importance that we in Scotland attach to the subject of education that, in every year since 1945, in the Estimates debates, we have chosen, either as the Government or as the Opposition, to include the topic of


education. As has already been pointed out, the difficulty has been to find time for a debate because of the inability of the Government to make up their minds in the earlier part of the year whether or not a crisis was prevailing in the country.
Since this is the first occasion on which I have had the privilege and the honour of trying to take up the main points of criticism made from this side of the House, I hope that, as is usual, I shall have some sympathy and consideration from the House itself.
My hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, East (Mr. G. M. Thomson) mentioned earlier today that, while attitudes to education differ, education itself is related to economic conditions and to the society in which we live. I am afraid that many of our good friends in the teaching profession itself are inclined to forget, as so many other people are inclined to forget, that the social services, of which education is one, will either progress, be static or regress according to the progress which we make in the economic field and the eagerness with which the Government of the day take up the main problems.
It has been evident since last December that the Scottish Education Department itself has been a victim of the blowing hot and cold economic policy, the acceleration and braking policy, pursued by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. There has been a lack of continued progress in this matter of the development of education, whether it be in the schools, in the enlistment of teachers or in any other of the main problems. In the circular of 4th December, 1954, the Secretary of State for Scotland indicated that at that time additional economic resources were being made available for unsatisfactory schools. He made it clear that this was in addition to the allocation, and that while priority had to be given to the new building, the schools of which my hon. Friend who was then the Member for Tradeston (Mr. Rankin) spoke two years ago could then be tackled.
In February we had the increase in the Bank Rate, and the action of the Chancellor in using the Bank Rate, which is indiscriminate in its effect, which again threw up the problems and, indeed, had an effect on projects irrespective of

whether they were desirable or not. Then, six weeks later, the Chancellor again indicated that by this time we could speak of the liberation of the human spirit, but in the circulars issued subsequently, the most recent of which is the most damaging, local authorities were, in fact, discouraged from going ahead with the building of schools.
We on this side of the House urge the Secretary of State for Scotland not to follow the words of the popular song and say, "Anything you can do we can do better." There is a growing volume of opinion in Scotland which believes that Scottish education is now in a crisis, and we think it would be apposite if the Joint Under-Secretary would indicate that there is an overall plan which will provide for what we think are the priorities.
First, not in the sense of importance, there are new buildings and the demolition of old ones; secondly, the enlistment of more qualified teachers and a reduction in the size of classes. Reference has been made by my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, East and also by my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) today to the comprehensive school, and that means a re-examination of the 11-plus examination, which separates children after seven years of comprehensive education.
If I may now deal with some of these headings, I would point out that the Educational Institute of Scotland, which is a very important body, made this statement during the last Election:
A greater proportion of the national expenditure should be allocated to the needs of education. The nation is devoting a smaller proportion of the national expenditure to education than it did before the war.
I hope that the Joint Under-Secretary will examine this matter and endeavour to assure us that, if this is so—a responsible body of this character would not make such a statement without a real grievance —the Government will take action about it at the earliest possible moment and ensure that Scotland gets her fair proportion of the total capital investment in new buildings.
My right hon. Friend the Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) referred to schools. I ask the Joint Under-Secretary to make a plain, categorical statement so that out of this order, counter-order and disorder local authorities may be able to plan for some time


ahead and, in that way, use their resources to the best possible advantage. I am encouraged to ask the Joint Under-Secretary to do this because the speech of the Prime Minister at the Conservative Party Conference recently indicated that he had received an assurance from the Chancellor of the Exchequer that if there was one thing which would not suffer, come what might, it would be education designed to increase our available scientific manpower. If the Joint Under-Secretary can say that there will be no interference with the momentum of school building, that will be one of the best things that will have been done for Scottish education.
Answers have been given by the Secretary of State to Questions by hon. Friends of mine which have indicated that whereas in 1951—it was the present Government which cut the capital allocations in 1951, and that has had a most serious consequence for Scottish education since that time—the value of what was put in hand was about £7 million, it fell the following year to £3¾ million, and it was only in 1954 that we got back to the figure which obtained in 1951.
One of the most pressing problems is the provision of new places. I know that part of the Government's case is that they have provided more school places than was previously done. Indeed, in replying to an inspired Question by the hon. Member for Rutherglen (Mr. Brooman-White), the Joint Under-Secretary gave information to that effect. However, what he did not say was that about 19,800 of the 34,000 places were included in projects begun before 31st October, 1951. That information was supplied in an Answer given by the Secretary of State on 3rd May, 1955.
If I may turn to the shortage of teachers, which is a most complex question and certainly the most important one in the educational world, neither I nor any of my right hon. and hon. Friends pretend that there is an easy answer. The truth is, as hon. Members on both sides of the House have said, that the whole future of Scottish education turns on this question. It is not merely the future supply of teachers; it is also a matter of the increasing and cumulative effect of ineffective and unqualified teachers. If we are to accept unqualified and inefficient

teachers to take classes, we can surely only expect that what they produce will deteriorate and continue to do so until the standard crashes.
In the past, Scotland has been an economically poor country, and education has been looked upon by many families as a means of escaping from hard, cramping conditions. To be a doctor or teacher or a member of one of the other professions had its attractions. The Joint Under-Secretary has made his contribution in Advisory Council Reports. He made a speech in 1950 which I will not quote in full because of the pressure of time, but I should like to make a brief reference to it.
When he was leading the huge number of National Liberals in the House—all six of them—he made an astounding attack on the Government of that day because of their lack of action with regard to teachers. He said:
It is the kind of strain that can be borne for a time, and cheerfully—as I know it is—but which, if it is allowed to continue indefinitely or for too long, may bring down the whole edifice of education in Scotland."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 20th July, 1950; Vol. 477, c. 2489.]
He went on to say that the pride and glory of Scottish education in the old days was based mainly on the high attainments of the senior teachers, that our duty was fearlessly to inquire into the status, amenities and emoluments of the profession. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman still holds those opinions. He has now been in office in this Government for four years, and it is high time that education had some results from the policy which he advocated then, but it has not been implemented since he took office.
My hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock was right. There can have been few occasions in the past when the teaching profession was so disgruntled and—we must add another word—cynical about its conditions and about the efforts which are being made by the Government.
One thing about which I am profoundly sorry—I am sure the whole House will agree with me—is that the teachers themselves are the worst propagandists for their profession. A word of caution must be uttered about this, because pupils are reading and listening to the comments which the teachers are


making about their profession. If we can enlist the aid of the teachers—we must provide proper conditions for them—they can make the greatest contribution towards increasing their own strength.
One of the anomalies about the recruitment of teachers is that, whereas every other profession is raising its standard of entry, only the teaching profession has had its lowered, and that has been done by the Joint Under-Secretary and the present Government. One change which has come about in the profession is that the children of teachers are not now following their parents' profession to the same degree as in the past. If the Government can do something to increase the number of teachers and will retract the aggravating Amendment No. 7 made to the Regulations, they will have done one of the best things that can be done to help to assuage the feelings of teachers throughout Scotland.
The qualifications of the teachers have been lowered, the teachers are insufficient in number, they have become disaffected, and it appears to them that their once highly-qualified profession has been reduced to going cap in hand to the Government and asking for something which they believe to be their due. Scotland needs 3,000 certificated teachers now and by 1957 she will need 3,300 and this, it should be remembered, on the basis of 45 pupils to a class in the primary schools whereas in England the basis is 40. On that basis a huge number of classes are already overcrowded in Scotland.
It was said from this side of the House that we have 900 teachers who are without any teaching certificates whatsoever, but only today I was informed that that number has increased and that there are now over 1,000 teachers in Scotland who have no certificates at all. I wonder whether the Joint Under-Secretary knows that men who are without certificates and who have not completed their educational studies in other professions are being accepted to teach temporarily in our schools. We should be very grateful indeed for some information on that subject from the hon. Gentleman.
I do not know whether the House knows how near the educational system came to complete breakdown during last winter, which was severe. There were so many illnesses among teachers, both male

and female, and the pool of part-time teachers was not functioning as it had done hitherto because some teachers felt that they had not the same responsibility to turn out in the severe weather. Classes were bedevilled and class rooms were hung round with wet clothes and boots—a background which is not helpful in trying to increase the numbers in the teaching profession.
How are we to deal with the whole problem? My hon. Friend the Member for Stirling and Falkirk Burghs (Mr. Malcolm MacPherson) made a very valuable contribution to the debate, although he was so modest about it, when he spoke of the effect of industry in attracting possible recruits to the teaching profession away from teaching into industrial posts. Is it proposed to have consultations with industrial leaders to ask them to restrain the rapacity with which they go to the universities and use their talent scouts to attract possible recruits away from teaching?
I call in aid a report in the "Glasgow Herald" of 12th October of a meeting of the Convocation of the University of London at which
Dr. A. J. Richmond, chairman of a subcommittee which reported on the shortage of science teachers, referring to the increasing practice of industrial firms of sending talent scouts into universities offering employment to prospective graduates in science and engineering, said, 'The implication is not that we are opposed to proper guidance being given to undergraduates on future careers, but are merely disturbed at certain practices which appear to have certain undesirable consequences. The attractions of a teaching career are not usually put forward with the same vigour'.
The Appleton Committee also refers to this matter. We ask the Joint Under-Secretary to tell us what steps the Department is taking to deal with the problem at that stage.
Another matter which we must ask the Joint Under-Secretary to look at is the question of bursaries for pupils at senior secondary schools who are in their fourth and fifth year. All of us are aware that it is at this stage, when the child is 15, that the attractions of an outside job at £4 a week, which is not an unusual offer, make their appeal. I regret very much to say that many parents stand in the way of further education while the child is quite willing to remain in school. If bursaries of £40 for a child in its fourth year and £50 in the fifth year were


offered, subject, of course, to the parents' income, it might help to blunt the avidity with which children or parents look upon the attractive wages which await school children.
Several of my hon. Friends have referred to the question of the wastage of pupils in senior secondary schools. I agree that we can make too much of it, but the 1953 Report of the Education Department indicated that 25 per cent. to 30 per cent. of those who were leaving senior secondary schools were capable of qualifying for many of the professions. In that year about 15,000 pupils left school, and 25 per cent. of that would have meant about 3,000 to 4,000 extra coming into the professional pool.
I want to refer to the size of classes in emphasis of the need for teachers. The Scottish maximum is 45 for a primary school, 40 for a junior secondary school and 30 for a senior secondary school. In England, the figures are respectively 40, 30 and 30. On the basis of that standard, 27 per cent. of all our primary schools and 41 per cent. of our junior secondary schools are over-crowded. In Glasgow alone 550 classes are over-sized which, I am informed, means that 10 per cent. to 12 per cent. of the total school population are in over-crowded classes.
I should also like to say something about the promotion tests which decide whether, having completed the primary stage, a child goes to a junior secondary school or to a senior secondary school.
The "Report on Education in Scotland in 1954" states:
A disturbing feature in some areas is the excessive and unnecessary pre-occupation both of teachers and of pupils with the promotion tests: there is evidence that pupils in classes PVI and PVII are being specially prepared for these tests and that this practice is leading to neglect of such subjects as history, geography and nature study, which are not covered by the tests
I believe this to be one of the most wicked things that is going on in the sphere of education.
One of the main difficulties of the junior secondary schools is the meagre provision to meet the needs of those who have no pronounced academic ability. Yet those cover 80 per cent. of the school population. I agree with the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) and some of my hon. Friends in stressing

that far too much emphasis is placed on intellectual needs and requirements instead of trying to relate education in the junior secondary schools to the pursuits which our young people intend to follow in the future.
I am not minimising the very valuable work which many junior secondary schools do. The education provided there is both wide and liberalising, but I think that the effect on children of this calibration test—this promotion test—at 11-plus, segregating them after seven years of comprehensive education—because that is what it is—is indefensible on educational, social or any other grounds. It is creating great harm in some families during the children's most informative and impressionable years.
If education were a matter of the mind alone, there might be a cogent case for segregation, but if we really believe that education is concerned with the physical, emotional, social and spiritual development of the child, it is wrong to segregate children on the single criterion of their ability to pass a test confined to English and arithmetic. These aspects of personality are not always related to ability; the capacities and needs of children are as wide as life itself.
This examination is leaving many of them quite resentful, concluding that they are inferior to their own brothers and sisters, and making others objectionably superior. I think that we must reexamine this, and consider the effect, not only on the children, but on those parents who consider it a slur on their social prestige that their child should go to a junior secondary school rather than to a senior secondary school.
The real answer to this is comprehensive schools. I think that the Joint Under-Secretary will find that there is a growing volume of opinion, if it is not already the majority opinion in Scotland, that that is so.
I hope that the Joint Under-Secretary will say something about improved conditions for teachers and their superannuation. I asked him a Question today. I think he knows the point, and I hope he will explain tonight how it comes about that although there is a growing credit surplus, which is now 50 per cent. greater than it was in 1948, there is, nevertheless, a deficiency in the fund, and that teachers are being asked


to pay increased contributions. It would also go a long way in allaying their fears if the Joint Under-Secretary would say what are the Government's views on including a provision in the superannuation scheme for a widows' and dependants' fund.
To sum up, I want to say that we accept the Report and express our appreciation to those engaged in the administration of education and in the schoolroom. We believe that in the light of changing world conditions, education, in its widest sense, must play a more positive part in a national plan for Scotland's future, that it should not be a by-product of our activities, that it should be planned and linked up with our intellectual, industrial and commercial interests and help us to achieve, in the technical sense, higher material standards in the future.
We think that three principles should govern whatever plan which we hope the Government will produce. First, there should be equal opportunity for all children, irrespective of their social status; secondly, provision of basic education for all children, so that they may grow up into responsible citizens, able and willing to take their part in the general community life; and, thirdly—a point stressed so forcibly today—provision of skilled scientists, technicians, administrators and craftsmen on whom our economic well-being depends.

7.16 p.m.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. J. Henderson Stewart): I should like on behalf of my hon. Friends on this side of the House to join with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) in the tribute he paid to the memory of our late colleague, Hector McNeil, whose death we all greatly regret.
I am in a little difficulty, because I understand the arrangement was that this debate should finish at 7.30.

Mr. Woodburn: I think it should be put on record that there have been two interruptions to that arrangement by the Division which took a quarter of an hour and the intimation from Black Rod. Therefore, it would be a fair division of time if a quarter of an hour were taken by each side for the debate.

Mr. Stewart: I do not mind. I would be grateful, Mr. Speaker, if you would

advise me whether I should stop exactly at 7.30 or whether you feel, as the right hon. Gentleman has suggested, that we should go on to 7.45. We have not had a Government speaker at all so far.

Mr. Speaker: The Question is, "That this House do now adjourn," and the right hon. Gentleman is entitled to speak as long as he feels disposed to. It is a matter for the convenience of the House, but he should not, I think, scamp his speech unduly.

Mr. Stewart: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have had, of course, as usual, a very interesting debate, covering a great variety of topics, and even if I were to speak the whole half-hour—I hope to be able to make it less—I could not possibly cover all that ground. Therefore, I must try to pick out the main topics of our discussion rather than deal with each Member's speech, as one sometimes does.
The right hon. Member for East Stirlingshire mentioned one or two matters on which I may perhaps say just a word. I agree with him about the necessity for improving what he called the "hygiene" of the schools. In answering him, I can also answer the hon. Member for Bridgeton (Mr. Carmichael) and one or two others.
Hon. Members will recall that last December we announced to the local authorities that further moneys would be made available to them for the purpose of improvement in the hygiene of these schools—for example, the lavatories. The hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) raised the matter of staff rooms for teachers and that kind of thing, and I very much hope that we shall be able to make progress along those lines. We are entirely with the right hon. Gentleman in that.
He also referred to good manners. Here, again, he was talking language which we would all wish to talk. We should like our Scottish children to be the best mannered possible. We should like them to be a little more fluent in their talking. It is true that they are sometimes too restricted. All that is set out in the Report of the inspectors who deal with junior education. I may have time to deal with it a little more fully. It is also very much in our minds.
Like the right hon. Gentleman, I should like to see nursery schools established,


but, in the present circumstances, which everyone understands, I do not think that it would be right to divert the limited resources which we have in the way of building and all the rest of it to the problem of nursery schools until we have other schools built, or at any rate well on the way to being built.
My hon. Friend the Member for North Angus and Mearns (Mr. Thornton-Kemsley) spoke about potato-lifting. I must remind him that we have set up a committee to examine this rather difficult problem. We have always been confronted with the dilemma that there are the potatoes to be gathered and there seems no other way of getting them up except by the employment of children; and in so doing we interrupt their school course. It is a dilemma which all Governments have had to face, and we hope that the expert committee we have set up may be able to guide us.
I am moving rapidly from one topic to another. The hon. Member for Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) asked about bursaries. They affect two sets of people the children still at school and the boys and girls leaving school to go to a university. The hon. Member pleaded for a higher bursary for the boys and girls in the senior school so that they may be persuaded to stay on. Everyone agrees that one of the biggest tasks we have in Scottish education is to keep the clever children at school and prevent them from going out to dead-end jobs.
That proposal was examined by the headmasters whom we consulted about this problem of what we called wastage. It was the view of most of those headmasters, and their number was very representative, that money was not the main attraction. It was one attraction, but merely to increase this grant to senior schoolchildren would not solve the problem. As hon. Members know, we have twice increased the grant in the last year or two. The senior school grant in Scotland is higher than in England and, to that extent, we are ahead of England. We give our senior schoolchildren more and higher grants than those in the South receive, and I do not think that we should be wise to go any further at this stage. As to bursaries for the universities—

Mr. Woodburn: There is a point I did not put to the hon. Gentleman which

is rather important. The Government have made several announcements that they propose to make family allowances available for children remaining at school until they are eighteen. I am not clear about the position. There was nothing in the Budget last week. Has the hon. Gentleman any information about what is the intention of the Government in this matter?

Mr. Stewart: I am obliged to the right hon. Gentleman; I had forgotten that point myself. Last night the Prime Minister said in the most emphatic terms that this proposal as contained in the Gracious Speech is going through.

Mr. Speaker: If the proposal involves legislation it would be out of order to discuss it on the Motion before the House.

Mr. Stewart: At all events, the news for the right hon. Gentleman is good.
Regarding bursaries for students at universities, it is true that the bursaries we give are somewhat less than those given in England for a similar purpose. We have had this out before and the hon. Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison) took the same view as I take, that it is not right to compare the two figures or to say that we must have exactly the same in Scotland as in England. I think that the hon. Lady shares my view that on the whole our bursaries are not very far wrong in size. They are based on careful inquiries at the universities about what the students have to pay for lodgings, fees, books and so on. The figures on the latest Regulations, the House will notice, again indicate a rise, and I think we have twice increased those bursaries. Those figures are not unreasonable, in my opinion, and I do not think we should be wise to go further.
Not many months ago I met the students and we had a very friendly discussion. They put certain suggestions to me regarding the administration of bursaries, for which I was grateful. Hon. Members may have observed that one or two of the proposals in the new regulations are administrative, and they are the result of the talk which I had with the students. We shall be glad if the students will keep in touch with us, and we shall always be most sympathetic and ready to do what we can.

Miss Herbison: On the question of bursaries for senior pupils at school, may we take it that the hon. Gentleman's answer means that, from the information received from headmasters and from other sources, the Government are not considering any increase; because it does not seem to me good enough to say in these circumstances that ours are better than those in England and that therefore we should keep them as they are? The bursaries in England are pitifully small, and I believe that we should examine this matter from the point of view of the needs of our own people. I urge the Minister to give further consideration to this serious matter.

Mr. Stewart: We are always ready to look at it again, but at present our intention is to make no further advance.
I believe I am right in saying that the new regulations for students' bursaries are so new that they may still be prayed against. They make an increase, and, I think that we have gone far enough at present.
I was asked about superannuation by the hon. Member for Maryhill. I think that his was the only one reference to it, although I was expecting many more. The difficulty of the hon. Member, or rather the difficulty of those who correspond with him, is that there is in Scotland today a credit balance to the teachers' superannuation scheme of about £38 million or £39 million. On the other hand, the actuary has pointed out that there is a substantial deficit on the fund, and correspondents of both the hon. Member and myself cannot understand that.
Actually, it is quite easy to understand. This is a long-term pension scheme. It happens that at the moment the amount of money paid in is in excess of the amount to be paid out and there is a credit balance of £39 million. But looking to the years ahead, and to the time when the teachers now in service will have to be paid their pensions, the actuary has certified, and the Scottish working party of teachers and employers accepted his advice, that the scheme is in fact in deficit as an insurance scheme. I do not think that there should be any difficulty about understanding that. The House will know that we have been in close touch with the teachers and the local authorities on this superannuation scheme, and it may well be that further opportunities to discuss it will arise.
Some of my hon. Friends raised the question of equal pay—I am sorry if I appear to be rushing, but the House will understand why. We must face the fact that, rightly or wrongly, this House and both parties in it, and this Government, have accepted the principle of equal pay. There has been no vote against it or objection to it. It is now applied to the Civil Service. It is now applied to the English teachers and, by the action of my right hon. Friend, it is now applied to the Scottish teachers. There has been no vote against that and, so far as I know, there has been no criticism. My hon. Friends have been approached by a group of teachers in Scotland whose purpose in life—perfectly legitimately—is to fight for the men in opposition to what they think is the advance of the women.
There are a small number of them, the figure is very small indeed in comparison. I can assure my hon. Friends that there are many times more teachers in the E.I.S. than in the Scottish Schoolmasters' Association. I met the Scottish Schoolmasters' Association and had a talk about this topic. They presented their case which was largely an expression of anxiety about the future, and they did so with great force. There is no doubt that there is something in their case, and it was fully considered by my right hon. Friend and myself, but we came to the conclusion, taking everything into account, that we had to go forward with this equal pay arrangement.
It is not for me to look into the future. I have not sufficient authority to answer my hon. Friends and say that they have no need to fear. I cannot say that, but from all the information which I have, I do not believe that there are grounds for the extreme anxiety which is now expressed by these men teachers. I think that most of the higher posts in teaching in the senior schools will ultimately, as indeed they are now, be held by men. However, that is for the future to decide. I really do not think that I can go back upon this, and I hope that my hon. Friends, whose anxieties I fully understand, will not feel over concerned about the matter.

Miss Herbison: The Minister has just said that he met the Scottish Schoolmasters' Association. Is that the first time that any Scottish Minister has met any teaching body apart from the Educational Institute of Scotland?

Mr. Stewart: We are on a rather technical matter of procedure now, but the hon. Lady will know that the equivalent body in England to that of the Scottish Schoolmasters' Association is consulted by the English Ministry of Education on such matters. I am only stating the facts as they were in the hon. Lady's time and as they still are. Nothing has been altered in the matter since this Government came to power. The English Ministry of Education has always consulted the equivalent body in England on this kind of matter. It was consulted in this case. We thought it only right, since the S.S.A. is now associated and officially linked with the English body, that, as one half of it was consulted in England, we had to consult the other half in Scotland. That is why we did it.

Mr. Ross: Does that mean that in any future salary negotiations, and in everything else, this principle will be followed? It will certainly be advocated.

Mr. Stewart: There is no difficulty about that. I should be very pleased to write to the hon. Lady and to other hon. Members concerned, or to meet them and to give a full explanation of that. However, I must ask the House not to expect me to use up my time on this point when there are more important matters to discuss.

Mr. Woodburn: It has always been and still is the principle of the Government in the bigger trade union field only to meet in negotiation bodies which represent a substantial proportion of the people who wish to discuss wages. My understanding of the body in question is that it represents only a small minority, not only of the profession, but of the men themselves. Up till now the general principle of Government negotiation has been only to negotiate with those bodies which represent a very substantial proportion of a profession or trade. The Minister has now altered that principle. I hope that he has consulted his right hon. Friend the Minister of Labour, because this is going to introduce great difficulties into the National Joint Council and other bodies from which certain trade unions are excluded because they cannot qualify under that principle.

Mr. Stewart: It is a great pity that hon. Members have raised this matter now, because I would ask them to believe

that it is a very tricky matter. I should be only too glad to give a complete account of our actions in this matter on another occasion. It has given both my right hon. Friend and myself a great deal of anxiety. I repeat that only in this restricted matter have we thought it right to accord to the Scottish Schoolmasters' Association a right of interview in the same way as that right has all along been accorded to its opposite number in England by the English Minister of Education. As I have said, I will gladly give a full account of our actions on another occasion when, I have no doubt, the right hon. Member for East Stirling-shire will think that we have done the right thing.
I have been asked a number of questions about the Appleton recommendations. The Appleton Committee made three recommendations. The first was that teachers with first and second class honours in mathematics, physics and chemistry should be deferred from National Service. The House now knows that action along those lines has been taken. The second recommendation was that retired mathematics and science teachers might remain in or return to service if given full pay and full pensions. That question was asked today by an hon. Member opposite. The answer is that we are now in the process of examining that proposal. The third recommendation was that student teachers of mathematics and science should receive generous allowances, without the imposition of a means test, during their training college year. That also is being examined at the present time.
The Appleton Committee made a number of long-term proposals, connected largely with salaries, and on that matter I am glad to be able to make the following announcement to the House. The Appleton Committee's proposals on salary changes were passed to the National Joint Council on 31st March, the date of publication of the Appleton Report. The Council discussed these proposals fully and carefully, and it has now informed us that at its meeting on Friday last, 28th October, the two sides of the Council reached broad agreement, though the details have still to be worked out.
Under the agreement, certain salary increases will be recommended for the teachers in secondary schools, but they


will not be confined to teachers of mathematics and science. The Council hopes to submit its detailed recommendations to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State by the end of November. I can, of course, assure the House that we shall act upon these recommendations as quickly as possible.
The Appleton Committee, as I say, made a number of long-term recommendations. It wanted the better deployment of teachers among schools. We are taking action on that matter. It wanted to encourage more pupils to stay on at school, and we are taking steps in that direction. I remember that in one of our recent debates, the hon. Lady the Member for Lanarkshire, North urged me to take further steps by way of propaganda—posters, lectures, broadcasts, and so on—to encourage people to become teachers. All that we are planning to do. We have already sent pamphlets round to the schools and universities, and, more recently, we have got the assent of the universities to our sending one or two teachers to the universities to meet the students and to talk to them. So that we, too, like industrial leaders, will send our representatives there. I am glad to see that I have the support of the hon. Lady the Member for Lanarkshire, North on that matter.
I had wanted to say a lot about junior and senior secondary schools, because, after all, it is the schools and the children about whom we are concerned, and I should very much have liked to tell the House of the improvements and developments that we have in mind for junior and senior secondary schools. As the House knows, the report by the inspectors, which is a very interesting document, has had a very wide circulation for a document of its kind. Indeed, I am told that it has had almost an exceptionally wide circulation. It has been followed by the production of a film, which I shall be glad to arrange to have shown in the House of Commons if hon. Members would like to see it. It is a fascinating film, and we are taking steps to make it known throughout the country. Our inspectors will meet the teachers, and we shall do everything we can to follow the broad liberal ideas set out in this film.
We are not satisfied with the junior secondary school as it is today. It has got to be developed in many directions, as

was said by the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland. I have time only to say that that is our firm intention. The terms of development in which we are thinking in regard to senior secondary schools will include the introduction of a new kind of examination. Again, I would have liked to have time to develop that point. There may be a future opportunity to do so.
By those and similar means we are trying to take away from our Scottish schools the old academic bias that on many occasions has kept us from advancing as the schools of other countries have advanced. There is a place for the academic subject—I had academic training myself—but in these modern times it is not everything, and we have plans to go much further ahead.
I now turn to the subject of building. It is quite clear that all the future work which we would like to do cannot be advanced with any hope of success unless and until we increase the supply of teachers, and until the already great and steadily growing building programme is carried through to completion. These two tasks—the finding of an adequate number of teachers, and the building of enough schools—together form the crucial problem facing local education authorities now and in the years immediately ahead.
With regard to the former, I have been asked about uncertificated teachers. I have not the latest figures in my mind, but there are too many of these teachers in our schools. The House knows that we are doing everything humanly possible to recruit more teachers. We are trying to get children to remain longer at school, so that more will be able to go to the universities. I think that in the matter of education we are getting a very fair crack of the whip. The House will have noticed that the P.E.P. report issued the other day mentioned that 23·4 per cent. of university graduates go into teaching and the same percentage into industry. That is a great deal better than I had expected, but we must try to improve upon it, by making teaching more attractive, and improving the staff rooms and the rest of the conditions.
I agree that we should regard teachers as members of a very high profession, and I also agree that teachers are not always their own best friends in this matter. We should like to increase their


salaries. Indeed, they have been increased in recent years. My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Renfrew, East (Sir G. Lloyd) said that there had been only a 5 per cent. increase since 1951. That was a slip of the tongue; there has been a 40 per cent. increase since January, 1951, in the salaries of teachers. I have here the list, year by year, of these salary increases.
The matter in which I take a little satisfaction—I will say pride—is that in the last two changes upwards special emphasis has been laid upon increased responsibility payments. I took the view, as did my right hon. Friend, that even if we have not vast sums to play with we should at least try to compensate, as much as possible, those men and women who are holding positions of high responsibility. We are doing all we can at present, and we shall do more in the future, to increase the numbers of teachers. My right hon. Friend and I will be grateful for any help which is given to us in this matter.
As hon. Members will recall, there is also the problem of building. Last night the Prime Minister said, in simple, plain words, that the educational building programme stands—I am now answering the hon. Member for Maryhill—and there appeared in the Press this morning a statement in the same sense by the Minister of Education as regards England and Wales. My right hon. Friend has not issued such a statement, and does not intend to do so. The reason is that the statement issued by the Minister of Education refers to the educational programme, "as announced" by him during the summer. As I understand it, it covered practically all the projects which education authorities in England and Wales intend to carry out between now and March, 1957, and—I would like to ask the House to note this—the projects and programmes to which the Minister had, by the summer of this year, given formal approval. Those programmes amounted to no less than £80 million for 1956–57 in England and Wales.
Our conditions, and the drill about the submission of programmes and projects, are somewhat different. My right hon. Friend has been able to approve a considerable number of projects submitted to him by authorities for work to be done

over the next two years, but the greater part of their programmes—although it is well known to us and is in accordance with our wishes—has not yet been submitted to him for formal approval. In Scotland, therefore, we are unable to say, as the English Minister of Education has said, that "the educational building programme, as announced, is being maintained." I wish to make it abundantly plain, however—and I hope that this is a completely clear answer to the hon. Member's question—that our intention in this matter is no less firm than that of the Minister of Education for England and Wales.
My right hon. Friend desires that education authorities in Scotland shall, subject to the observance of strict economy in all their projects, proceed with approved projects with all speed, expedite the submission of other projects ripe for approval, and push forward as quickly as possible in all the planning stages of whatever further projects they regard as essential for the performance of their statutory duties. In the words of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in his Budget speech:
…we have to do all we can to meet imperative needs—in the case of education of the rising school population."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 26th October, 1955; Vol. 545, c. 211.]
Do not let the House ever forget that the figures for the rising school population in Scotland are, in many ways, terrifying, as they are in England. In the case of primary schools the bulge is going down, but in secondary and senior schools the rise in the next 4, 5 and 6 years is going to be as much as we can possibly meet. It is a most serious matter, and that is why we must do all we can to meet the imperative needs of a rising school population.
It is for this reason that the Government are according special treatment for education, but I wish to emphasise again that in present financial circumstances this special treatment lays upon the authorities a special responsibility to practise strict economy in the carrying out of their programmes. That the Government are ready to support all essential work in this field is proved by the fact that we have already provided for a total educational building programme—including technical building—of at least £11 million in 1956–57, compared with £6 million last year.
I should like to develop this point further, but I trust that I have said enough to indicate that we mean to go ahead in all the many fields with a forward, progressive policy of education. My hope is that by the end of this Parliament we shall all be proud to say that Scotland has stepped briskly forward to this great object.

Mr. Martin Redmayne (Lord Commissioner of the Treasury): I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.

Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

Orders of the Day — AGRICULTURE (IMPROVEMENT OF ROADS) BILL

As amended (in the Standing Committee), considered.

Clause 1.—(PROPOSALS FOR IMPROVEMENT OF ROADS.)

7.51 p.m.

Mr. Tudor Watkins: I beg to move, in page 2, line 25, at the end to insert:
on such terms as the Council with the approval of the Minister, may approve.
During the Committee stage the Minister was good enough to invite the Committee to consider certain Amendments, one of which I am now moving. This Amendment concerns unadopted roads. We are not anxious that the liabilities of owners should be lifted by the new subsection which has been brought into the Bill. We do not like the extinguishing of the liabilities. The Minister gave the Committee the objections he saw against accepting our Amendment, in particular the difficulty of finding out the responsible persons. We agree that that may be difficult, but there may be persons who, upon the grant of Crown land many years ago, might have an obligation to maintain highways which may become unadopted roads under the Bill.
We do not want the Bill to extinguish the liabilities of large landowners for making a contribution to the construction of unadopted roads. If the responsible people cannot be found, that is no argument against saying that they must make a contribution, and for extinguishing their liabilities altogether.
The Minister pointed out that in some cases obligations had lapsed because of disuse of the roads, but we cannot understand that. We believe that once a very good road has been constructed by the highway authorities owners will pop up once again, to take advantage of the better roads that have been made. I would not altogether agree that the obligations have lapsed and that there is no liability left.
The Minister referred to the task of getting co-ordination in the crofting counties. As a Member for a Welsh constituency, I am not familiar with what


happens in the crofting counties. The Minister said he would look at that matter between the Committee stage and the present stage of the Bill.
People who had liabilities in connection with these highways still have them in many cases. I put to the Minister a point which some of my hon. Friends may not have put during the Committee. What is to happen under our drainage Acts? Are the rights and liabilities of people to be done away with in future legislation? There should be liabilities on landowners when erosion or drainage takes place. The same applies in connection with river boards. I know of cases where local authorities are trying to interest river boards because of the erosion of banks, but the river boards say that they have no responsibility at all and they put it back upon the owners of the land.
The new subsection relieves all these people of their liabilities for maintenance of highways and of any responsibility for unadopted roads. What has been the result of the consultations since the meeting of the Committee? I hope that the Minister is now able to bring forward practical proposals to meet our arguments, which were very earnestly considered and supported in the Committee. If large estates have passed to the Forestry Commission what is to happen about construction of highways there? Is the Commission to be relieved of the responsibility of making a contribution?
In Committee I mentioned the very good example of people who want cattle grids. There has been no great difficulty about it and in the districts I know best there has been a great deal of voluntary co-operation. I hope that the Minister has been able to consider the Amendment and that he will accept it.

Mr. Sidney Dye: I beg to second the Amendment.
Naturally, we are disappointed that the Minister has not put down an Amendment for the Report stage, after considering the matter which was most clearly stated in the Committee. We tried to state the case fairly from the point of view of those whose duty it would be, under the Bill, to prepare a scheme. We wanted to see the matter from the point of view of the county councils, who are the highway authorities and will have the duty of preparing schemes. Being

responsible to the electors the county councils should do everything fairly. Nobody should get an abnormal advantage out of a scheme to make or reconstruct a road in an area where somebody else previously had an obligation to maintain a road. All previous obligations are to be wiped out by the Bill.
Conditions should be laid down, and known not merely to the people concerned but to the electors, to whom the county councils are under an obligation. It is important, where it is known that an obligation to repair or keep open a road exists, that some means should be found during the negotiations, either by a capital contribution that would wipe out future maintenance costs or in some other way, to come to a private arrangement. It should not just be that the county council prepares a scheme and, with assistance from the Ministry, carries out the repair or reconstruction of the road, while the persons who previously had the obligation to do it get off scot-free.
We want to strengthen the hands of the county councils in this respect in preparing a scheme. We want to give them power in the Bill by which they can make terms on which an owner whose obligation is being liquidated does something towards the maintenance of a road. It is, therefore, important. Had an Amendment which we moved in Committee been carried—that wherever a road is improved under this Bill it should become a classified highway and that the State should then make its contribution to the annual maintenance afterwards—our case would not be so strong.
8.0 p.m.
Under the Bill as it stands, the entire cost of maintenance of the road in the future is placed upon the highway authority. We want to ensure, therefore, that that authority can, while formulating the scheme, arrange that any such owner such as we envisage in this Amendment—and there are numbers of them—shall meet the cost either by a capital grant or by a future annual contribution. It is one or the other—or any other alternative which may occur. Account would be taken of the financial circumstances of a particular owner, who might be in a position to make an annual contribution in the future but not to make a considerable grant towards the reconstruction of the highway concerned.
We regard this as important to the county councils in that we ought not to use this Bill as a means of bringing an improvement to the value of a property—such as occurs when a highway is reconstructed as we envisage here—without that obligation on the part of an owner. As we were disappointed that the Minister had not himself thought of a method of solving this, we are putting forward the Amendment that was debated in Committee, on which the arguments for and against seemed very equally balanced and on which it seemed to us that there was a case for an Amendment of that nature to be accepted.

The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. D. Heathcoat Amory): I, too, am disappointed that I have not been able to bring forward an Amendment on the lines of that which has been moved by the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Watkins). I should like to repeat what I said at an earlier stage, which is that I go a very long way with the hon. Member in his views on this matter. It would not be unfair, in principle, that those who have been previously liable for the repair of the road should make some contribution. At that time I said that, from a study I had made the practical objections outweighed the advantages of making the proposed change in the Bill. Although I promised to reconsider the matter, I said that I might have to come back to the House to say that I still felt as I did then.
I went away with a distinct bias towards finding a solution on those lines if it were possible. We have looked at this very thoroughly and have taken a good deal of trouble over it. We have considered a number of possible draft Amendments, and I must say that I was, myself, astonished to find that every one of those draft Amendments brought us up against quite a surprising number of technical difficulties. For instance, there was the effect of the application of the capital moneys under the Settled Land Act and the Law of Property Act. As I say, it seemed astonishing that it should be necessary to make such heavy weather—as I am advised it is—in a simple transfer of money from the person liable for the upkeep of the road to the county council.
In spite of those difficulties we went ahead, as I said we would, and consulted the organisations concerned. We consulted

the County Councils' Association, the Council for Wales—again, the National Farmers' Union and the Country Landowners' Association. In the first place, I daresay that the House will not be surprised to know the National Farmers' Union and the Country Landowners' Association were opposed to the change proposed—but not on grounds of principle. They felt that this change would make those at present responsible for the roads less anxious that the roads should be taken over by the county council. As we know, these roads have been allowed to run down, and it is possible, in some cases, that the liability for the upkeep which has not been carried out would be quite a heavy one. One reason why the roads have run down and why upkeep has not been carried on is that, in any case, the owners responsible have not been able to afford to do it. That was the attitude of those bodies.
The Council of Wales agreed, as I do, that there is something in the principle of the suggested change, but it expressed itself as definitely against compulsory contributions. It thought that there would be some inconsistency if compulsory contributions were imposed under Clause 1 but not under Clause 3. The County Councils' Association was most unenthusiastic about the change. That organisation, again, had no objection to the principle—I do not think anyone can have—but, like myself, it had serious doubt as to whether this proposed change would, in fact, be workable or worth while, The impression it gave us was that it felt that the change would be more trouble than it was worth.
Those are the results. I want to give them quite frankly, because I think that in our discussions before and today the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues have dealt with this matter most moderately. The bodies most concerned, and, I think, best qualified to judge, have agreed that as a practical proposition this change is not worth while including in this legislation. There were, of course, other objections which I mentioned at an earlier stage, and to which the hon. Member has referred—the liabilities for upkeep attaching at present to all sorts of people, and, astonishing as it seems, not always to the existing owners and occupiers of the land adjoining the roads. There are, therefore, real difficulties; not only practical


administrative difficulties but certain difficulties of justice in discovering the person who really should carry forward this liability. I repeat that there is not any real analogy between these roads, and private streets where the owners and beneficiaries are easily identifiable and well known.
In conclusion, I should like to say that all these objections, and particularly the lack of enthusiasm on the part of the highway authorities, who might be expected to benefit most from this change, have led me to conclude that it would be a mistake to include this Amendment in the Bill. With reference to what was said by the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnor, I would point out that provision is made in the Bill for voluntary contributions, and I hope that in some cases those will be effected.
I am very sorry that I have been unable to meet the wishes of hon. Members, which I think are essentially reasonable, and I would like to have met them, but I am sure that in this case, in view of the practical considerations that I have mentioned, the conclusion that I have reached is right.

Mr. George Brown: I know of no man who can do the wrong thing more regretfully, more sympathetically and more kindly than the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Agriculture.
Let us be quite clear what he is doing here. He is making a naked and unashamed surrender to landlordism, and the fact that the Minister thinks that this Amendment is right and fair and he regrets that he cannot accept it makes his surrender none the less complete.
I am astonished at the content of the right hon. Gentleman's answer. What is proposed by this Amendment which was moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Watkins) in so cogent a speech and seconded similarly by my hon. Friend the Member for Norfolk, South-West (Mr. Dye)? To none of their arguments has the right hon. Gentleman addressed himself. The Amendment makes nonsense of his reply. The Amendment says that the obligation of the landlord or the occupier to contribute to the upkeep shall be extinguished
on such terms as the Council with the approval of the Minister, may approve.

"Such terms" includes anything. If the people cannot be found, then there are no terms at all because there is no one to whom they can be applied. If it is not worth the trouble, there is nothing to do. The council can say to the Minister, "We recommend that in this case it is not worth the trouble going after the people," or "The people are too small to go after," and so on and so forth. But in a case where the landlords are available and have substance, it leaves the council in a position to take a contribution from them.
I know there is nobody like a draftsman for discovering why no set of words ever means anything at all. I have been through all this and I know the position. But there are some occasions when Ministers have to say to draftsmen, "This is what I want to do. I want the landlords, where they are available and where they have substance, only to get out of their obligation on condition that they contribute something."

Mr. Roderic Bowen: I should be grateful to the right hon. Gentleman if he would indicate whether, when he uses the expression "landlord," he includes the Forestry Commission, and, if so, what terms he would suggest a council should make when the Forestry Commission are in the position of landlords.

Mr. Brown: I am not one of the men in Whitehall who know best. The terms are terms for the council to negotiate with the people whose interests they are extinguishing. I certainly think it should apply to the Forestry Commission.
One of the extraordinary things about this attitude of the Minister is that bodies who can well afford to make their contribution are being let off so that the whole burden falls on the ratepayers of very poor counties. That is inevitably so. Montgomeryshire, Merionethshire—in fact, all the Welsh counties—are, by comparison, relatively poor counties. It is bad enough when an ordinary landlord is relieved of his obligations and they are put on the ratepayers. It is even worse when a public authority which can get money for the purpose is also let off and the burden is put on the ratepayers.
What are the Minister's objections? As I was saying, there is the objection about


the technical difficulties of drafting anything. This is the sort of thing that a Minister who is not in command of his Department will always find himself hampered with. But there comes a time for every Minister to say, "I am sorry, but this is what I want to achieve. I will spell it out for you as simply as I can. All you have to do is to find the right form of words." My experience is that when a Minister says that, the draftsmen can always produce the form of words.
I do not see what is wrong with our form of words. This matter has nothing to do with the ancient Acts about the transfer of money from a private occupier to a public authority. Although the Private Street Works Act may not be completely analogous in other respects, it is analogous in this respect. Money is transferred without all these difficulties where private street works are concerned.
The Minister then produced a second difficulty. I thought it was fantastic. He referred to the objections of the National Farmers' Union and the C.L.A.—what, I think, used to be called the Country Gentlemen's Association.

8.15 p.m.

Air Commodore A. V. Harvey: They are quite different.

Mr. Brown: What they say, as I understand, is that it would make the landlords less anxious to have their obligations taken over. Has anyone ever heard anything like it? The landlords, who, at the moment, are not fulfilling their obligations—that is why the roads have fallen into such a bad state and that is why it will cost £3,000 a mile to improve them—would be less anxious to have their roads taken over and improved so that they or their tenants could farm their land better, if they knew that there was a chance that the council would make them contribute something towards the operation.
What do they prefer to do—to do it themselves? No, they prefer to continue not doing it at all. That is always likely to be the attitude of anybody if he can get away without doing it, which is what is being done at the moment. Obviously, in those circumstances, a man will not be keen to have it taken over by somebody else if he has got to contribute something towards it.
What is the point of the Report of the Council for Wales? The point of the Report is that agriculture and the economy of those rural areas which depend on that industry are suffering as the result of this situation. We are told by this Administration that it has so much more tender regard for the susceptibilities of landlords than it has for other people, that the fact that they have not done their job for many years shall not be a black mark against them and shall not involve any action against them. In fact, their whole obligation is to be taken over by the State, by the ratepayers and the taxpayers, and in case any of these gentlemen who have not done their job should get sufficiently awkward to prevent the ratepayers and the taxpayers doing it for them in the future, they are to be let off contributing at all to the job.
That is not an answer which ought to commend itself to the House. I do not think it is an answer that any Minister ought to accept. The fact that the County Councils' Association put it forward does not surprise me either, because these very gentlemen are not without a somewhat disproportionate representation in most of our rural county councils. I should think that it is very likely that the people whom we should see from the Country Landowners' Association would be the same people whom we should see from the County Councils' Association. We should not get two sets of opinion from them. We should get the same opinion from all these people under two different names.
The Council for Wales and the Minister support the Amendment in principle. We support it in principle and in every other way. We want this work to be done. We do not want to say that everybody must contribute, because we recognise that there would be some places where it would be difficult to enforce and other places where we would not want to enforce it—for instance, where estates have been broken up and people have been induced to buy small parts of the estate, probably at high prices. It would be wrong to visit the sins of their predecessors in title upon them.
We have, therefore, framed a form of words which permits the local authority, which, after all, will not use these powers vigorously but will use them with a great deal of restraint, to use them where it


is the right thing to do and where it can be done. We reserve the right of approval to the Minister so that in any case where a council is acting awkwardly or arbitrarily he will be able to disapprove the arrangements.
If the Minister feels as he has said about this, he has every reason to have his arm strengthened. He is by no means the most powerful Minister who has ever occupied that office. My regard for the Ministry is very high, despite all that has happened in recent months—and I say the "Ministry" and not the "Minister". My regard for the Minister and for the Ministry are not interchangeable terms by any means.
My regard for the Ministry and for its administration is such that I am not prepared to see that excellent Department trodden down in this way. I therefore hope that my hon. Friends will decide that this is a principle of some importance

—the duty of a landlord to do his job; if he does not do it, the right of the State to do it for him; and the overriding obligation on his part to make some contribution to his fellow ratepayers when they take over for him, especially as many of them are poorer than he is.

We let this go in Committee without a Division because the Minister came there with his tears and his friendly approach and told us how much he wanted to do it. We relied on him to stand up to the Country Landowners' Association and to the pressure groups of the county councils of rural England. He has not done so. I have no doubt his Ministry wish he had. In that spirit I hope my right hon. and hon. Friends will see this issue through the Division Lobby.

Question put, That those words be there inserted:—

The House divided: Ayes 115, Noes 167.

Division No. 34.]
AYES
[8.24 p.m.


Ainsley, J. W.
Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Colne Valley)
Noel-Baker, Francis (Swindon)


Allaun, F. (Salford, E.)
Hamilton, W. W.
Oswald, T.


Allen, Arthur (Bosworth)
Hannan, W.
Padley, W. E.


Awbery, S. S.
Harrison, J. (Nottingham, N.)
Palmer, A. M. F.


Bacon, Miss Alice
Hayman, F. H.
Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)


Balfour, A.
Herbison, Miss M.
Pearson, A.


Bartley, P.
Hobson, C. R.
Popplewell, E.


Blackburn, F.
Howell, Denis (All Saints)
Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)


Blyton, W. R.
Hubbard, T. F.
Price, Philips (Gloucestershire, W.)


Boardman, H.
Hughes, Cledwyn (Anglesey)
Pryde, D. J.


Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.
Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)
Pursey, Cmdr. H.


Bowden, H. W. (Leicester, S.W.)
Hunter, A. E.
Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)


Bowen, E. R. (Cardigan)
Hynd, H. (Accrington)
Ross, William


Boyd, T. C.
Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)
Royle, C.


Braddock, Mrs. Elizabeth
Irving, S. (Dartford)
Short, E. W.


Brookway, A. F.
Johnson, James (Rugby)
Simmons, C. J. (Brierley Hill)


Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)
Jones, David (The Hartlepools)
Slater, J. (Sedgefield)


Burke, W. A.
Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)
Snow, J. W.


Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)
Jones, T. W. (Merioneth)
Sparks, J. A.


Champion, A. J.
Kenyon, C.
Steele, T.


Coldrick, W.
Lawson, G. M.
Stewart, Michael (Fulham)


Collick, P. H. (Birkenhead)
Lee, Frederlek (Newton)
Stones, W. (Consett)


Collins, V. J. (Shoreditch &amp; Finsbury)
Lever, Leslie (Ardwick)
Summerskill, Rt. Hon. E.


Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)
Lewis, Arthur
Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)


Cronin, J. D.
Lindgren, G. S.
Thomas, Iorwerth (Rhondda, W.)


Cullen, Mrs. A.
McGhee, H. G.
Thomson, George (Dundee, E.)


Davies, Stephen (Merthyr)
McInnes, J.
Tomney, F.


Deer, G.
McKay, John (Wallsend)
Ungoed-Thomas, Sir Lynn


Dye, S.
MacMillan, M. K. (Western Isles)
Wade, D. W.


Edwards, Rt. Hon. Ness (Caerphilly)
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)
Watkins, T. E.


Evans, Stanley (Wednesbury)
Mann, Mrs. Jean
Wells, Percy (Faversham)


Flenburgh, W.
Mason, Roy
Wheeldon, W. E.


Forman, J. C.
Mitchison, G. R.
Williams, Rt. Hon. T. (Don Valley)


Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)
Monslow, W.
Willis, E. G. (Edinburgh, E.)


Gooch, E. G.
Moody, A. S.
Winterbottom, Richard


Grenfell, R. Hon. D. R.
Morris, Percy (Swansea, W.)
Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.


Grey, C. F.
Mort, D. L.
Yates, V. (Ladywood)


Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)
Moss, R.



Hale, Leslie
Moyle, A.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:




Mr. Wilkins and Mr. Holmes.




NOES


Agnew, Cmdr. P. G.
Graham, Sir Fergus
Mawby, R. L.


Altken, W. T.
Grant, W. (Woodside)
Maydon, Lt.-Comdr, S. L. C.


Allan, R. A. (Paddington, S.)
Green, A.
Milligan, Rt. Hon. W. R.


Alport, C. J. M.
Grimston, Hon. John (St. Albans)
Molson, A. H. E.


Amory, Rt. Hn. Heathcoat (Tiverton)
Grimston, Sir Robert (Westbury)
Nabarro, G. D. N.


Anstruther-Gray, Major W. J.
Grosvenor, Lt.-Col. R. G.
Nairn, D. L. S.


Armstrong, C. W.
Hall, John (Wycombe)
Neave, Airey


Ashton, H.
Harrison, A. B. C. (Maldon)
Nicolson, N. (B'n'm'th, E. &amp; Chr'ch)


Atkins, H. E.
Harrison, Col. J. H. (Eye)
Nield, Basil (Chester)



Harvey, Air Cdre. A. V. (Macclesfd)
Nugent, G. R. H.


Baldwin, A. E.
Harvey, John (Walthamstow, E.)
Oakshott, H. D.


Banks, Col. C.
Harvie-Watt, Sir George
O'Neill, Hn. Phelim (Co. Antrim, N.)


Barber, Anthony
Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel
Page, R. G.


Barlow, Sir John
Hill, Mrs. E. (Wythenshawe)
Pannell, N. A. (Kirkdale)


Barter, John
Hill, John (S. Norfolk)
Pickthorn, K. W. M.


Bell, Philip (Bolton, E.)
Hinchingbrooke, Viscount
Pitman, I. J.


Bevins, J. R. (Toxteth)
Hirst, Geoffrey
Pitt, Miss E. M.


Bidgood, J. C.
Hope, Lord John
Pott, H. P.


Biggs-Davison, J. A.
Hornsby-Smith, Mist M. P.
Powell, J. Enoch


Bishop, F. P.
Howard, Hon. Greville (St. Ives)
Price, Henry (Lewisham, W.)


Bossom, Sir A. C.
Howard, John (Test)
Raikes, Sir Victor


Braine, B. R.
Hughes Hallett, Vice-Admiral J.
Ramsden, J. E.


Bryan, P.
Hughes-Young, M. H. C.
Redmayne, M.


Buchan-Hepburn, Rt. Hon. P. G. T.
Hulbert, Sir Norman
Renton, D. L. M.


Campbell, Sir David
Hurd, A. R.
Robertson, Sir David



Hutchison, Sir Ian Clark (E'b'gh, W.)
Roper, Sir Harold


Carr, Robert
Hutchison, James (Sectstoun)
Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard


Cary, Sir Robert
Hylton-Foster, Sir H. B. H.
Russell, R. S.


Channon, H.
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Schofield, Lt.-Col. W.


Clarke, Brig. Terence (Portsmth, W.)
Jenkins, Robert (Dulwich)
Sharples, Maj. R. C.


Cole, Norman
Jennings, Sir Roland (Hallam)
Simon, J. E. S. (Middlesbrough, W.)


Cooper-Key, E. M.
Johnson, Dr. Donald (Carlisle)
Spens, Rt. Hn. Sir P. (Kens'gt'n, S.)


Corfield, Capt. F. V.
Johnson, Eric (Blackley)
Stoddart-Scott, Col. M.


Craddock, Beresford (Spelthorne).
Keegan, D.
Storey, S.


Crookshank, Capt. Rt. Hn. H. F. C.
Kerr, H. W.
Stuart, Rt. Hon. James (Moray)


Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E.
Kershaw, J. A.
Studholme H. G.


Crouch, R. F.
Kirk, P. M.
Summers, G. S. (Aylesbury)


Cunningham, Knox
Lagden, G. W.
Sumner, W. D. M. (Orpington)


Dance, J. C. G.
Leavey, J. A.
Taylor, William (Bradford, N.)


D'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry

Thompson, Kenneth (Walton)


Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. McA.
Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H.
Thompson, Lt.-Cdr.R.(Croydon, S.)


Doughty, C J. A.
Legh, Hon. Peter (Petersfield)
Tilney, John (Wavertree)


Duthie, W. S.
Lindsay, Hon. James (Devon, N.)
Touche, Sir Gordon


Eden,Rt.Hn.SirA.(Warwick &amp; L'm'tn)
Lloyd, Maj. Sir Guy (Renfrew, E.)
Vickers, Miss J. H.


Eden, J. B. (Bournemouth, West)
Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh
Wall, Major Patrick


Elliot, R. Hon. W. E.
Mackeson, Brig. Sir Harry
Ward, Dame Irene (Tynemouth)


Emmet, Hon. Mrs. Evelyn

Waterhouse, Capt. Rt. Hon. C.


Farey-Jones F. W.
McKibbin, A. J.
Whitelaw, W.S.I.(Penrith &amp; Border)


Finlay, Graeme
McLaughlin, Mrs. P.
Williams, Gerald (Tonbridge)


Fisher, Nigel
Maclay, Rt. Hon. John
Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)


Fleetwood-Hesketh, R. F.
MacLeod, John (Ross &amp; Cromarty)
Wills, G. (Bridgwater)


Fraser, Hon. Hugh (Stone)
Macmillan, Maurice (Halifax)
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Fraser, Sir Ian (M'cmbe &amp; Lonsdale)
Macpherson, Niall (Dumfries)
Wood, Hon. R.


Freeth, D. K.
Maddan, Martin
Woollam, John Victor


Galbraith, Hon. T. G. D.
Marples, A. E.
Yates, William (The Wrekin)


George, J. C. (Pollok)
Marshall, Douglas



Comma-Duncan, Col. A.
Mathew, R.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Gower, H. R.
Maude, Angus
Mr. E. Wakefield and Mr. Godber.


Question put and agreed to.

Clause 3.—(CONTRIBUTIONS TOWARDS EXPENDITURE ON IMPROVING ROADS.)

8.30 p.m.

Mr. Watkins: I beg to move, in page 3, line 25, at the end to insert:
(4) (a) Where a council are willing to enter into an agreement under this section and a two-thirds majority (in terms of acreage owned) of the owners of land which would be benefited by the proposed agreement are likewise willing and so inform the council in writing, the council may subject as hereinafter provided thereupon carry out the improvement to which the proposed agreement relates and shall be entitled on completion of the necessary works to recover the expenses incurred by them in so doing summarily as a civil debt from the owners of the land benefiting from the said works;

(b) before proceeding to carry out any improvement under the foregoing subsection the council shall first serve on every owner of land which in their opinion would benefit from such improvement a notice of their intention to carry out the works and of their provisional apportionment of the cost thereof and in the event of any such owner serving within one month of the date of such notice written objection to the proposed works or to the provisional apportionment of cost the council shall not proceed with the said works until such objection has been determined either by agreement or by reference to a court of summary jurisdiction.
This is another Amendment which we discussed in the proceedings in Committee. The Joint Parliamentary Secretary promised further consideration and consultation, particularly with the Council


for Wales, but again no Amendment has been put down by him or by the Minister, and I take it that we are not to get anything from the Government. Therefore, I suggest that the House should give consideration to what is put forward in this Amendment.
We do not want a minority of owners to hold up a scheme on which there has been a voluntary agreement. The words of the Amendment only mean that if two-thirds of the owners are willing to make a contribution but a minority does not want to give anything the minority shall come in. The Ministry of Agriculture has had experience of a minority of people not coming into schemes when the country was in need of food production. Because one owner held out against a scheme on common land the Ministry was not able to proceed with that scheme. This Bill is very necessary for food production in the livestock rearing areas, and we do not want that sort of thing to happen.
It is a question of the frustration by a minority. I would emphasise that the Amendment does not mean that hon. Members on this side of the House are in favour of a compulsory contribution. All these contributions are voluntary, but, in a situation in which two-thirds of those concerned are in favour, we cannot see that it is right that the minority should hold up a very important proposed road scheme. The Amendment has been put down in order that we may have the views of the Minister or the Joint Parliamentary Secretary after consultations have taken place.

Mr. Dye: I beg to second the Amendment.
Here again, I think we should try to see this Bill operating from the point of view of the elected representatives in the area. They are the people on whom the obligation is placed to propose schemes for road improvements, and in nearly every case there will be more than one landowner concerned. Inevitably, the question will arise how much these people are prepared to contribute towards the capital cost of a particular scheme. We may have six different landowners involved, and five of them may be very enthusiastic in desiring the scheme to go forward, while the sixth may be just an awkward kind of cuss. We might find them in Wales. I feel perfectly certain of that, and, if not,

maybe we can export one or two from Norfolk or somewhere else, but there they are.
We cannot always get all the people who are to benefit to agree to make a contribution towards the cost of the scheme. What is the county council to do? Is it to go forward on the basis that five will contribute and one will not, or will it put forward a scheme in which none of the six will contribute, but in which the amount they should have contributed will have to be borne by the ratepayers in the locality? We do not think that that would be a fair solution.
If, after the fullest possible consideration, there is one person—or more—standing out against a scheme which is designed for their particular benefit, and almost for their benefit alone, to which the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the local ratepayers are making contributions towards the cost, should the scheme be dropped and the five honest and upright farmers be prevented from having the advantage of a road improvement scheme?
To me, that situation does not seem to be met by the provisions of this Bill, and we want to assist and guide county councils in their work in this respect. We hoped that the Minister, in his further study over the very long vacation which the House has had, now that he has been to the uttermost parts of the earth—maybe from Russia, where the Parliamentary Secretary has been, or from other parts of the world—would have gathered the inspiration necessary to meet this particular point, but we are disappointed.

Mr. G. Brown: What warmth was m him was frozen out.

Mr. Dye: He leaves us where we left the matter in Committee upstairs without any guidance on this matter, and we fear that, because of this weakness, the difficulties of the local authorities which propose these schemes will be made greater. They will have no power to deal with the unwilling or unfaithful type of people in these areas who might improve their own financial position and increase the productivity of their holdings to the benefit of the nation.
That is the purpose behind this Amendment—to enable the people who are now hindered from making the fullest and best use of their land, because of the lack of


an adequate highway to it in order to bring in the supplies necessary for the farm and to get the products away, to benefit. It is because of the conditions of these highways that we wish to strengthen the arm of the local authority.
We do not want this for the sake of forcing anybody to do something against his will. We want to be able to deal with the awkward person who will not try to meet the needs of his neighbours by assisting in the preparation of a scheme. We want authority for the county council to deal with that type of person, and the Amendment would give the county council such authority. If the Amendment is not accepted and the Minister has nothing else to suggest, there will be a flagrant flaw in this small Bill which is designed to assist in the improvement of roads in parts of the country which have suffered long without the amenity of a modern highway.

8.41 p.m.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. G. R. H. Nugent): I am glad to be able to tell the House that we consulted the Council for Wales, as I undertook to do in Committee, and the Council confirmed the view, which it had expressed in a general way previously, that compulsory contributions of any kind would be inadvisable. I recollect that the right hon. Gentleman specifically asked me whether the Council had advised on this aspect, and I was unable to say that it had because the matter had not then been put to it. However, we have specifically put the matter to the Council, and the Council strongly advises us not to impose compulsory contributions of any kind.
The fact is that the practical difficulties would be considerable. I feel that I ought not to keep the House long in enumerating them again, but perhaps I might just mention them in order to put them on the record and to explain and justify the course I am now recommending to the House.
First of all, there is the very real difficulty of determining who are the benefiting owners. Some owners could easily be defined, but others would be much more difficult to define. Indeed, there would be the difficulty of those who had obligations in respect of unadopted roads which were to be extinguished by adoption under these schemes and who perhaps were not going to benefit at all from

the schemes. There would immediately be difficulty in determining who were the benefiting owners.
The next difficulty, which I think would be more formidable still, would be that of assessing contributions. I am certain that the acreage basis would be unacceptable because it would be altogether too inequitable. The land concerned might vary, as it does in the Welsh uplands, from rough moorland worth nothing to good farmland worth perhaps as much as £2 per acre per year.
There would, thus, be real difficulty in finding a satisfactory basis for assessment of contributions. Probably one would be driven to an independent valuation as the only fair method of doing it, and that would be an expensive thing to do and it would require some time. There would also arise the difficulty of an appeal, as provided for in the Amendment. Right hon. and hon. Members opposite have rightly foreseen that there would be objections from these people, and, consequently, they have provided for an appeal to the magistrates' court.
8.45 p.m.
Undoubtedly the unwilling owners would wish to appeal, first of all on the ground that they were not the benefiting owners and should not come into the scheme at all. Secondly, they would wish to appeal against the basis of assessment. Those appeals would be contentious affairs. They would be considerably time-consuming and undoubtedly would have a disturbing effect on local sentiment. If an appellant succeeded in his appeal, what would the county council do, supposing there was a contributory scheme of this kind? Possibly it would have to drop the whole scheme.
It is for that kind of reason that we feel that the practical problem here is pretty considerable. Bearing in mind that in the upland areas the majority of owners and occupiers are people of very limited financial resources and that, more often than not, the unwilling minority would be people of limited financial resources, I have very considerable doubt whether it would be wise to coerce them—and that is what it would mean.
I was glad to hear the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Watkins) declare himself not in favour of the principle of compulsory contribution. The rights of the minority are important to all


of us. There are occasions when minorities must bow their heads and agree with the majorities, but if that obligation can be spared we are very glad. The hon. Member for Norfolk, South-West (Mr. Dye) asked me if I did not find inspiration in Russia. I certainly found plenty of inspiration for ignoring the rights of minorities in Russia, but that is not the kind of inspiration that I have brought to inspire my work here. I believe that, wherever we can, we should not override and coerce minorities, unless there is an overwhelming case for so doing.

Mr. Dye: Would the position then be that, if one person holds out against the scheme, the scheme must be or can be dropped and the others who might benefit would not receive the benefit? What is the answer to that point?

Mr. Nugent: The answer to the point is quite clearly in the Bill. Indeed, we have discussed it at length in Committee. The answer is that the Bill as drafted will provide that county councils or highway authorities can promote schemes on the basis that they undertake their part of the cost after having received the grant that we give. They can then receive voluntary contributions from the affected landowners in the neighbourhood. But it is undoubtedly within the discretion of the county councils to proceed without any contributions at all. Indeed, if in a poor area the county council thought that nothing would be forthcoming, it would be very wise to do so. I suspect that in some areas where the people had deeper pockets the landowners very likely would go to the county council and say, "We should be glad to make a contribution if you go ahead with the scheme."
The Bill, as drafted, is completely flexible on that point. Because one person is unwilling to contribute there is no need for the scheme to fail, but if the Bill were drafted in the way which is suggested by hon. Members opposite, the scheme might very well fail in the event of an appellant in a magistrates' court appealing successfully against the proposal, because the county council would have made its proposition on the basis that all the benefiting owners came in. Be that as it may, we feel that here is a case where, in the nature of things, we

are dealing with people who are in limited circumstances. Therefore, it would be most unwise to compel the unwilling minority to come in and contribute. It might make for very hard cases.
It is for these reasons that I strongly advise the House to accept the Clause as drafted. It really takes account of the practical nature of the problem. By leaving it open for highway authorities to accept contributions where they can be made but otherwise to bear part of the cost themselves, and bearing in mind that we shall make a pretty substantial grant, which, in many cases, will be 75 per cent., or even more for unadopted roads, we think that here is a proposition sufficiently attractive for many highway authorities in these parts to take advantage of it. In these circumstances, I hope that the House will accept the Clause as striking a sensible, practical balance and will not ask that the minority should be coerced.

Amendment negatived.

Mr. Dye: On a point of order. Is it not your intention, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, to call the last Amendment on the Order Paper—Clause 5, to leave out lines 1 to 5—standing in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) and other hon. Members? It is a matter in which we wanted to bring the definition of an area to benefit into harmony with the Title of the Bill. The Clause, as it now stands, relates predominantly to mountains, hills or heath. That seems to be quite out of harmony with the Title of the Bill, which was prescribed as being for agricultural purposes—and mountains, heaths and hills are not agriculture. During the Committee stage, I addressed arguments at considerable length to this definition, and on that occasion the answer was, in my view, very unsatisfactory. I should have thought that those were sufficient grounds for this Amendment to be debated on the Report stage.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Rhys Hopkin Morris): That argument might have been in order in Committee, but at this stage, the Bill having left Committee, the effect of the Amendment would be, possibly, to extend the charge, and the test is the form of the Bill as it left the Committee. Therefore, it is out of order.

8.51 p.m.

Mr. Amory: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
The Bill comes before the House for Third Reading very much in the same form as it was originally introduced. At the same time, I feel that we are indebted to hon. Members opposite for two Amendments, particularly the one which requires that schemes for road construction improvements be submitted to Ministers, and approved by them, within seven years.
Looking at the Bill now, I think that that is a useful Amendment, entirely in line with the broad intentions of the Bill, and that it should help to ensure that proposals are put in hand without loss of time. We have been unable, as we have explained to the House, to accept other Amendments, notably those providing for payments to persons liable for the upkeep of unadopted roads taken over by the highway authorities, and for compulsory contributions for improvements from the owners in certain circumstances.
Apart from the other difficulties which we have mentioned, we find that, however justified these changes may be in principle, we have definite evidence from those whom we think best qualified to judge the effects, that they do not feel that these particular changes would, in practice, help to further general aims of the Bill. That, after all, is the important thing.
Throughout the debates which we have had, I think that there has been general agreement that, so far as it goes, the Bill has been sound and useful. The criticisms which have been made have taken the form of expressions of disappointment that the scope has not been wider. I should like, in a few sentences, briefly to recapitulate the Government's view on that point.
The primary reason for assisting in the reconstruction of unclassified and unadopted roads in upland areas is to complete the work which was begun or could be begun under the Hill Farming and Livestock Rearing Acts. In a number of cases a quite heavy expenditure under these Acts is in danger of failing in its purpose because of inadequate access on the half derelict roads serving farms which have been assisted under the hill farming schemes. In other cases useful schemes are not worthy of putting

in hand unless the roads are improved. The poverty of these upland area farms, which is, in part, the case for these grants, is also reflected in the limited resources of the highway authorities. They have not the resources in terms of rateable value to be able to carry out the improvements without some assistance from the Exchequer; and I think it is agreed that in Wales and other comparable upland areas in England and Scotland the effects of this poor access are particularly serious.
In its Reports for 1950 and 1953 the Council for Wales stressed the difficulty that was created for Welsh upland farmers by poor access. It has prevented them from using to the full the capacities of their land, and in many cases it has not been worth while for a farmer to take advantage of Government assistance for development. In these circumstances there has been a steady drift of population from these areas, with the danger that, if nothing is done, a good deal of land will gradually go derelict.
For these reasons these uplands areas, in our opinion, constitute a special case, and we are proposing to provide this special assistance for road reconstruction in the belief that it is one of the things particularly required to set these farmers on their feet, enable them to pay their way and attain new prosperity. My hon. Friend and I have stressed throughout our debates that this scheme is really a new departure and very much of an experiment. If it proves a success, as I hope it will, it may have many lessons which will be relevant to conditions in other areas. I feel that we must go ahead and see. For that reason—because of the experimental nature of this project—and also because the needs of the upland areas seem to us most pressing, we feel it wise to concentrate our limited resources in the way proposed in the Bill.
Hon. Members may ask, "Is not the object of this Bill, and the spending of £4 million in Exchequer grants, contrary to the wishes expressed by the Chancellor to local authorities to restrain their expenditure? I do not think that it is.

Mr. G. Brown: Could not we have something more certain?

Mr. Amory: I do not believe that it is; in my opinion it is not. I do not know


what the right hon. Gentleman would like me to say. Perhaps he will suggest something.

Mr. Brown: Last night the Prime Minister told us that a lot of things were not to be cut, but that priorities in all these things were now subject to reexamination. The Minister cannot say that he thinks this will be in the first rank of priorities. He is the Minister, and a member of the Cabinet, and we are asking him to say whether the priority in this case is as strong now as when the Bill was introduced.

Mr. Amory: I wish the right hon. Gentleman would curb his impatience and let me proceed to my next sentence, because I shall be covering that point.
I have said that in my opinion this is not contrary to the expressed wish of the Chancellor. Provision is made for expenditure over seven years following the passing of the Act. The actual expenditure in the first year is bound to be light. It will take some time for local authorities to put forward their projects. We hope that they will begin doing so as soon as possible. My right hon. Friend the Chancellor has put on the brake in order to curb excessive current expenditure and immediate projects. The developments and improvements will continue to go forward, though they may do so at a more moderate pace.
Secondly, this Bill gives local authorities new facilities, but it is the local authorities that are to be free to settle for themselves the priority of their expenditure within their total resources. The third point I want to make is that the primary object of this expenditure on roads is to increase agricultural production in these areas.
The passage of the Bill and the putting in hand of the work that will result from it will not necessarily mean that the overall expenditure of local authorities will be increased. Therefore, there is nothing contradictory between the provisions of the Bill and the existing economic and financial policies of the Government, as explained by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor. If, as I confidently hope, this Bill becomes law, I trust that local authorities will put forward some projects as soon as possible. I wish to assure the House that I shall play my part in making

it effective with as much skill as I have. I hope that the House will give the Bill an unopposed Third Reading.

9.2 p.m.

Mr. G. Brown: To the extraordinary things of which the Minister has just delivered himself concerning how this Bill fits into the announcement made in the Prime Minister's statement yesterday, I will return in a moment. Of course, we on this side of the House will give the Bill an unopposed Third Reading in the same spirit as we gave it an unopposed Second Reading and have tried, despite every obstruction by the Ministers, to improve it on the way through.
We think that the Bill is in many ways inadequate and that it is wrongly and even badly drawn. But, in so far as it is an attempt, albeit a very poor one, to deal with a very serious problem, we on this side, who care so much for the rural parts of our Kingdom and who realise rather more importantly than do Ministers the part that agriculture could play—were it allowed to do so—in overcoming the country's real economic difficulties at the moment, would certainly not wish to impede it, however inadequate we feel it to be.
As the Minister says, we now own a very considerable degree of parentage of the Bill. As a matter of fact, one of the best commentaries on the extent to which we have improved it is the fact that the Minister now comes down and deals with it. All through the Committee stage the right hon. Gentleman was the most absentee Minister we have ever seen. He was obviously ashamed of the Bill. We had to talk at great length and resort to all sorts of devices to keep the Committee stage going until the right hon. Gentleman could pay us a visit. Even when he did come, he left again as quickly as he could. But now he comes along and speaks to the Amendments on the Report stage and says how much better the Bill now is than it was then, and how less ashamed of it he is. Of course, we had the assistance of the Secretary of State for Scotland, but his trouble was that he could not do his sums. Therefore, his attendance was not all that use, although we were glad to see him.
Another thing that shows how good the Bill has now become is that we have the presence not only of the "Third Man" referred to last night but of the 43rd man.
We now have with us the hon. Member for Peterborough (Mr. H. Nicholls) who, as far as I could see, was the forgotten man. We never heard from him before. The Bill has now assumed such proportions in the mind of the Ministry that it has now disinterred this unfortunate Parliamentary Secretary who was last seen in the basement where people who have nothing to do foregather. The hon. Gentleman has now come to the top storey and joined with us in the obsequies over the Bill, for the improvement of which Measure my hon. Friends and I must take some credit. I see that the forgotten man now wishes to be verbal as well as apparent. We are delighted to facilitate him.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Harmar Nicholls): I merely wanted to remind the right hon. Member that upon this side of the House there are no first, second or third men; we work as a team, as one man. I can understand that that is confusing to the right hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: We are dealing with the Third Reading of the Bill.

Mr. Brown: The only point I am making is that the hon. Gentleman has appeared during the Third Reading debate, whereas he has not been with us in the other stages. I thought I ought to draw attention to that fact.
Hard as we have worked to improve the Bill, I thought it a little unfortunate that the Minister began with the remark —I was not clear whether it was intended to be a boast or an apology—that he had not let us do even more good; that he had refused so many of our Amendments. All I can say is that he has been kind enough to observe that the Amendments to which he did agree have improved the Bill. The very great pity was that he, or his Joint Parliamentary Secretary on his instructions, so obstinately refused to accept the rest.
My hon. Friends will have something to say about the Bill, and I hope that the Minister will listen to them. I hope the Government will not be in too much of a hurry to get rid of it. There are other opportunities to think about this matter. It does not follow that because we are getting rid of it here it is impossible for the Government to have second thoughts.
In letting it go myself, I want to make one or two observations. First of all, I repeat that it is silly to delude ourselves that the Bill is other than totally inadequate. It provides for public grants of £4 million to be made available to assist in this important work. I give the Government full credit for bringing it forward, even though it is obviously open to me to claim that during the six years when the Labour Government were in power we did so many good things that we were bound to leave some undone. The fact that the Government have done something which we left undone, however, clearly entitles them to take a bow, and I am not one to refuse it. When I say that £4 million is inadequate, I am not without recognition of the fact that, anyhow, they are providing that sum.
Even so, if one starts to do a job it seems to me that a vital part of the business is involved in calculating how much the job really requires if it is to be done properly. During the Committee stage we had a lot of fun trying to see what this £4 million would achieve. Apart from the calculations of the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland, who could not do his sums, a variety of different figures was put forward by the Minister. During the Second Reading debate he said that he guessed there were between 2,000 and 3,000 miles of roads, and that he thought the cost would be about £2,000 or £3,000 a mile. That amounts to a cost, at the minimum, of £4 million, and at the maximum, of £9 million, and a guess of £6 million or £7 million would seem to be about right. That worried us a little, because the bulk of that cost—where it is not met by the Government—is clearly going to fall upon the very county councils who, by definition, are least able to find extra money.
The Minister just now said—I took his words down—that he did not think it at all necessary that local authorities' expenditure would increase. I do not understand what the words he used are supposed to mean. Even upon his first figures—I shall refer later to some subsequent ones which he used—here is a job which will cost well over £4 million; it may even cost £9 million, which is £5 million more than the Government are voting. If the expenditure of local authorities is not to be increased, who is to find the other £5 million? It must obviously come from the local authorities.
It cannot come from anywhere else. It must come from the Merioneth County Council, the Montgomery County Council, the Scottish county councils and the English county councils.
It may be that £5 million—several millions of pounds anyway—will be unloaded on to the ratepayers of what are inevitably poor county councils with a penny rate bringing in only a few hundred pounds. In some cases a penny rate produces only £500. One hon. Member mentioned £600 in the Committee. Where a penny only brings in £600, and we are talking about an extra expenditure of £5 million, it is no use—let us face it—the Minister trying to slide away. This will be an enormous addition to the money which these counties have to find.
In Scotland we find that the extra is more extravagant even than the figure quoted. One county council, with about 24 miles of road which may qualify for this grant, can bring in with a penny rate only about £60 with which to do the work. Obviously its expenditure must go up. We have felt from the very beginning that the Minister, on his own figures, was asking county councils that were already hard pressed to take a very large share, a much bigger share than they were likely to be able to afford, of this scheme.
Now the Minister comes down here and says that he does not think it will be so. He is very good at not thinking, and many of the things he does in this House give evidence of that. He had told us that the £5 million would not put up the expenditure of local authorities, but he now says that he did not say it. I do not want to be unfair, and I do not want to make this point at any length, but I took down the words as he said them. He said, when he was talking about the Chancellor of the Exchequer, "Local authority expenditure may not necessarily be increased." Then where is the £5 million to come from? He cannot find it, because his grant is not big enough.

Mr. Amory: It is within the option of local authorities, when considering their expenditure on the highways, to decide how much they allot to one type of road and how much to another.

Mr. Brown: Now we get a very different song cycle. I look a kindly fellow, but I am not without guile, and I suspected this. We are now told on the Third Reading that this is not a new job to be done on top of the others, that this is not £4 million extra to be provided by the Government, but that the Government expect that this grant will take the place of some other grant.

Mr. Amory: No.

Mr. Brown: Well, have another shot.

Mr. Amory: I repeat that it is at the option of the local authorities, who are free under the Bill to decide these things for themselves. We cannot say what decision a particular local authority will reach.

Mr. Brown: Except that the Minister has to approve the scheme—

Mr. Amory: Yes.

Mr. Brown: —and that the Minister has to say in the end whether it is to be done or not.

Mr. Amory: Certainly.

Mr. Brown: So that a local authority which says, "We want to do this job and we want this grant," may be told, "I am sorry, but you must knock something else out or we cannot approve." The Minister, having been voted this money, says, "I do not think that it clashes with what the Chancellor told us. It may not necessarily mean the expenditure of local authorities going up." When he is challenged he says, "I mean that if they don't do the job, or some other job, their expenditure will not go up." We knew that all along, and it does not get us anywhere if they do this job at the expense of some other job.
What other jobs are they not to do? It means they will make unclassified roads under the Bill, by disregarding the needs of classified roads in the county. What a contribution to the improvement of agriculture.
This really will not do. All along we thought that it was inadequate, and when the Parliamentary Secretary just now said that of course in the case of many authorities it means grants of 75 per cent. or even more, he does not tell the whole story. On the Minister's own


figures, the money being provided can only mean something less than 50 per cent. overall. If some authorities are to have 75 per cent. or even more, others will get a good deal less than 50 per cent. and be down among the 10, 15 and 20 per cent. grants. That must be so. Four million pounds out of £9 million leaves £5 million. Therefore a 50 per cent. grant in aid on the average cannot be granted.
If someone gets 75 per cent. or more, someone else has to have 50 per cent. or less to even things up. In this wicked world one cannot have things both ways. One of the harsh economic facts of life which the Minister has to learn is that in this world there is no way in which one can have all of this and all of that also. There has to be something of this and something of that—and something in the middle turns out to be your lot. Sums have the most awkward way of having to be done in the end so that the figures in the margin all add up to the total at the bottom.
I think that this is inadequate, that the Government all along have known it to be inadequate and that it has been "sold" at the very top of its appeal. Always the references have been to the very lucky people, without really saying, quite frankly, that a lot of them are not to get it. At one stage we were told that Wales was to get half of the money. The Secretary of State for Scotland, in the passages with which he entertained us, told us that there were 1,000 to 1,500 miles of roads involved in Scotland. If we go on with this essay in figures, which the Ministers find so difficult to follow, the Ministers say that there are between 2,000 and 3,000 miles of these roads in the whole Kingdom. The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland says there are between 1,000 and 1,500 miles in Scotland—that is a half. Half the money is to go to Wales and half to Scotland—yet it applies to England as well. It really is the most incredible performance.
As I said before, the Bill really has not been thought out on this basis at all. There has been tossed in £4 million—and it will do some good; I give credit there. But it is silly to "sell" it on this very high note, when the slightest examination of any of the figures shows how ridiculously inadequate it is. Every time the Minister makes an essay in this

direction his figures change. In Committee, he did not talk about 2,000 to 3,000 but about 4,500. In column 153 of the Committee Report, he says:
The total mileage of roads that we think might be in need of improvement in this category is about 4,500 miles."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee A. 19th July. 1955; c. 153.]
For some reason, he assumes that 1,500, or one-third, are not to be put in at all. When the Bill was "sold" to us it was on the basis, not that a lot were to be ruled out, but that this was a genuine attempt to deal with a very great need in the upland areas—and all these figures relate to upland areas.
I therefore say that it is inadequate, and Ministers ought to accept that it is inadequate and ought not to mislead in this way. After all, there is no Election in front of us next month—we have had that. There is no need to defraud, to cheat and distort now. They have some time before the next Election, so they really ought to tell the truth now; and as we are past the Election no doubt they will—as the Minister just now did— "come a little cleaner" about it.
Another point I want to raise is this. Even suppose that the Government say, as I think they should, "That is all we can find, but it is £4 million more than you provided, and there it is," quite clearly we have established our case for the moment that it is inadequate. I want to ask the Minister what I proposed to ask him anyway, but I am all the more bound to ask him now in the light of what he said: where does this stand in the light of the Budget?
I have no doubt that the Parliamentary Secretary will be replying to what I have said so far. What I am now going to say —and this implies no personal unfriendliness to the Parliamentary Secretary—is that I think the Minister ought to ask the leave of the House to speak again, simply because the Minister is a member of the Cabinet and the Parliamentary Secretary is not. The Minister knows what the discussions have been on this matter and he alone can commit the Government, whereas the Parliamentary Secretary cannot. Therefore, I hope that the Minister will intervene again by our leave, which I am sure we shall be glad to grant, to clear up the ambiguity which he has introduced.
We have been told by the Chancellor, the Minister of Housing and Local Government and the Prime Minister that local authority expenditure is to be drastically reduced. There is no equivocation about that. Everyone understands that to be the case. Last night the Prime Minister gave a long list of things already announced that were not to be cut, and among them, he said, was the road programme already announced. He said that would be proceeded with. Then he introduced ambiguity by saying that the priorities would be looked at again. In other words, "We will not cut them but shall put some of them back." Of course, if they are not done, that is tantamount to a cut, but it is a rather nicer way of saying so.
I hoped that this paltry little provision was covered by the assurance that the road programme that had been announced stood. I cannot understand how the Minister would not know that if it was true. But the Minister did not say tonight, "I assure you that this is one of the things that will stand because it was announced before the cuts." He said, "I think it will be all right." What Ministers think may be evidence but it is not conclusive. He thought I was unduly impetuous in asking him to clear this up. But, after all, he must know. The Cabinet has settled this. I asked him to tell us, and he said, "In my opinion, this does not clash with what the Chancellor has said." What we want to know is, what is the Chancellor's opinion about this?
The Minister says, "If it is passed unopposed, the House can be assured that will do all in my power." That sounded to me like a Minister warning us that the rest of his colleagues were not going to let it through but that he was a good chap. Otherwise, why the words, "I will do all in my power to get it through; in my opinion, it is all right," unless the Minister is indicating some difference?
I ask the Minister to clear this up with an authoritative statement. Is this exempted from the announcement about the ban on local government expenditure? Is this exempted from the cut, or is it not? The Minister called it a brake. Perhaps the Minister would like to interrupt me and reply. Is this exempted from the brake on local authority expenditure? Has the Minister no comment?

The Minister does not say that I am wrong. The Minister has no comment, and that is the position. The Minister does not know whether it will be possible to put the Act into operation when it has been passed. I see the Minister has a comment to make.

Mr. Amory: Surely the right hon. Gentleman knows that what the Chancellor of the Exchequer has said refers to current expenditure and projects which are on hand or proposed. We are talking about a Bill which has not yet been passed, and there are no projects on hand.

Mr. Brown: The Minister is going along with me. The Chancellor said that current projects can continue but that projects not yet started will be subject to the brake. This is a project which has not yet started and, presumably, it is subject to the brake. Therefore, Merioneth, Anglesey, Brecon and Radnor, Montgomery, Cardiganshire and the Scottish county councils had better be told that this may be just so much window dressing which will never start. The Minister of Agriculture tells us that he cannot give an assurance that it will come into operation because it is a project not yet started and he is not clear about it.
What about the increased cost to local authorities? We have already been told that up to £5 million will fall on the local authorities as increased expenditure, but that was at the rate of interest then prevailing. Now the Chancellor has said that local authorities are to be forced into the market to borrow money instead of borrowing it from the Public Works Loan Board. We have heard a lot about the credit-worthiness of local authorities, but when it comes to going to the market I wonder how credit-worthy a local authority will be counted in which a ld. rate brings in £600 and which has a rate already of well over 20s. in the £.
The rate of interest of some of them will rise considerably and the cost to local authorities of carrying out this scheme, by the time the Bill becomes an Act, will be very much more than seemed likely when the Bill started on its journey. Should I be wrong if I guessed that the total cost for the local authority section alone may be inflated by up to £2 million simply through the increase in interest rates on money which they will have to borrow in order to do the job.

Mr. Niall Macpherson: They need not borrow at all.

Mr. Brown: They will not get this out of rates when a penny rate brings in only £600. They would be saving up for years, and the Government are against the never-never principle. The authorities will have to borrow. That is the only way local authorities carry out schemes of this kind.
The position is that, even if the scheme starts at all, it will cost local authorities a great deal more than Ministers have yet been frank and honest enough to say. We have said that if the Bill is carried the £4 million will do a limited and meagre job—if it ever gets started. The Minister is unable or unwilling to give a specific assurance that the Bill will become an Act and that the Act will be implemented and not subject to a brake by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. He has not told us what he intends to do about the increased costs to local authorities. In those circumstances, this may become just one more in the long list of frauds and deceits about which we have been talking this week.

9.30 p.m.

Mr. Goronwy Roberts: Before we part with this Measure, I think the House should consider briefly its origins, because the intention of the Bill as it stands has much to do with those origins. The original intention of the Government was to introduce a Measure to deal with the position in the Welsh uplands.
The Council for Wales, a Government-established body, reported in 1953 on the serious decline of economy and population in the Welsh rural areas and made a number of recommendations. Of those recommendations, the only one the Government accepted was that a special Measure should be brought forward to remedy the state of the access roads to Welsh hill farms. Even that recommendation has gone by default in the event, and, instead of a Welsh Bill specifically attending to a special Welsh need we have this portmanteau Measure, which tries to cover the needs of three countries—England and Scotland as well as Wales.
The result, I fear, is that the Bill as it stands may well not meet to any considerable extent the needs of any one of those countries as it is a comparatively

small sum of money which will have to be spread over a very long mileage. How much that mileage is we really do not know. It is substantial enough in Wales, I should say, to dispose of the £4 million in the Principality. In my constituency of Caernarvon, there are one or two quagmires into which the whole of this sum could disappear without trace. The sum of £4 million spread over seven years, allowing for the fact that in the initial year very little will be spent, will not yield more than £600,000 per year to deal with 3,000 miles of rural roads, many of which are in a terrible state. That is the problem.
Welsh Members are bound to ask whether the Bill as it stands can possibly touch the fringe of the very real social and economic problem in rural Wales. Nothing that has been said by the promoters of the Bill, either on Second Reading or in Committee, has really enlightened us as to the extent to which the Principality, which originally was to be the sole beneficiary of such a Measure, will in fact benefit. My right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) has dealt with a point I raised in Committee about the statistical peculiarities which attend this Bill and the fact that the Minister on Second Reading undertook that one-half of the sum would be devoted to the needs of Wales. In fact, the Minister said:
about half, or perhaps a little more than half, of the money will be devoted to the Principality."—[OFFICIAL REPORT. 22nd June, 1955: Vol. 542, c. 1326.]
If we add "a little more than half" for Wales to the half for Scotland, the plight of England will be even worse than as described by my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper. In Committee the Scottish statistics were even more peculiar.
This is the central weakness of the Bill. The Minister has tried to squeeze everybody into the Bill knowing, I suspect, that those who will have to implement the Measure will have to squeeze somebody out of it. There is the main criticism of this Bill, that in the event when it is administered it will not achieve its object. Somebody will have to be thrown overboard, and I am afraid it is not difficult to imagine who that somebody will be. It will be the poorer authorities, the very counties which most need the assistance which a Measure of this sort could give. The Bill cannot help the upland


counties of Wales unless the grant approaches almost complete parity. We know we cannot get more than 85 per cent. or 75 per cent. according to the kind of road involved. To find the remainder of 25 or even 15 per cent. will tax to the uttermost the resources of most of the Welsh counties for which this Bill appeared in the first place.
The product of a penny rate in the neighbouring county to my ownMerioneth—is barely £500, and, unless the grant is very high indeed, that county 41 find it impossible to provide its share of the money, unless it does what my right hon. Friend has suggested it might have to do, that is to say, economise on other expenditure on other roads in its care.
I am afraid that the Minister, in intervening to reply to my right hon. Friend, seemed to indicate that he rather thought that is how these counties would work; that, in order to make use of this Bill, they would dip into the monies which, notionally, they would be setting aside for other roads for which they are responsible.
Then there is the problem of maintenance. The poorer the authority, the more inhibited it will be from availing itself of the provisions of this Bill, even though the initial grant may be very high indeed, and these are precisely the authorities and exactly the counties where the problem of access roads is most urgent.
I suppose we must hope for the best. We are dealing with a section of the population which enjoys very few amenities indeed, as compared with the people who dwell in our towns. The vast majority of these hill farmers, at least in Wales, know nothing of the blessings of electricity or of a piped water supply. They live and work in remote, lonely and often stormy places. They and their children have to walk miles to church or school. The onset of a sudden illness means that they are trapped there, very often without hope of medical assistance, and, in many cases supplies of coal, fodder or other necessities have to be dumped at great distances from the homesteads and carried by hand over ditches and quagmires.
We really ought to be doing something more for this class of people. This is rather a mean little Bill. It cannot help

a most deserving section of the population to any great extent. I would end by making this appeal to the Minister. Let him not wait for seven years to see how this Bill works out. If, within a year of two, he finds that the intentions of this Bill are not being achieved under its provisions, let him come back to this House and ask for more powers and new finance, and hon. Members from rural areas on both sides of the House will unite to see that he gets them.

9.38 p.m.

Mr. F. H. Hayman: This Bill is designed for the improvement of certain roads situated in or affording access to livestock rearing areas, and a livestock rearing area is described in page 4 of the Bill as
an area consisting predominantly of mountains, hills or heath, being an area in which the principal industry, or one of the principal industries, is the breeding, rearing and maintenance of sheep or cattle;".
I begin to wonder just where Cornwall comes in here. We have heard a lot about Wales and Scotland and about some parts of England, but I am wondering whether Bodmin Moor, in Cornwall, would qualify under this definition of a livestock rearing area. If it does, and if, as the Minister has said this evening, the money which may be set aside by the county council for the purposes of this Bill may have to be taken from the vote for highways expenditure, I would remind him that, a fortnight ago, I met representatives of the Wendron Parish Council at the very spot where he, when he took up his position as Minister about 14 months ago, met the representatives of Cornish agriculture.
At the very spot where his car was parked, there are crossroads, and the parish council has been petitioning the county council for years to improve the vision at these crossroads and at others close by. The Cornwall County Council tells me that the Minister of Transport cut its estimate for this year from £100,000 to £45,000 for all the roads in Cornwall. What hope is there for the improvement of the crossroads? Further, there is no provision, even in the Bill, for the hundreds of miles of unadopted farm roads in Cornwall, let alone the thousands of miles of unadopted roads in the rest of England; and these are a problem already because of heavy transport to and from farms, and they will become a greater problem as time goes on.
We cannot help remembering the debates of the past few days, and that heavier burdens are being placed upon local authorities because of the great increases in interest rates and on other accounts as well. Although we give the Bill a blessing, we hope the time is not far distant when there will be a realistic approach to the whole problem of farm roads.

9.42 p.m.

Mr. Dye: I rise to speak on the Third Reading of the Bill in order to express the very great disappointment which the farmers and others in Norfolk will experience at the failure of the Government to allow amendments to the Measure which will enable them to benefit.
At the time of the General Election the Norfolk Branch of the National Farmers' Union called together the candidates of all political parties in the county and asked them, among other questions, what effort would be made, in view of the need for some special contribution for farm approach roads and fen roads, to induce the Government to extend the provisions of this Bill to include them.
It appears that the Bill has no enthusiastic support from hon. and right hon. Members opposite. I suppose they feel that it is too timid a Measure to take its place in the group of things which county councils will have to consider in making their future estimates. It looks as if we have failed to broaden the basis of the Bill, and as if those who come within its narrow ambit will find it difficult during the next few years to get any benefit whatever from it. After all, the county councils are now engaged upon their estimates for the year 1956–57. Therefore, they will not be in a position to include any schemes under the Bill in their estimates for next year. Consequently, I find it difficult to see how the Bill is to bring very early relief to the areas which really need it. That is its first weakness.
It was, of course, conceived last March and even then there were indications that there might be difficulties later on, but when the Bill was reintroduced in the new Parliament there was the prospect that something might come of it for the benefit of people in the hill and stock-rearing districts. As one who fought in the Election, and as one who has done his best

in Committee to improve the Bill and to extend its provisions, I must say, on behalf of my constituents and the farmers of Norfolk, that we are not satisfied.
We do not believe that we ought to be asked to wait and see how the Bill goes in Wales and Scotland and to assume that if it goes well we shall be considering, in seven years' time, doing something for England. I should have thought that in present circumstances, when we ought to be increasing production from the land so as to enable us to cut down imports, there should have been a greater sense of urgency about a Bill of this kind.
The Minister of Agriculture in moving the Third Reading, was very limited in what he had to say and did not hold out many prospects of improvement. I cannot help thinking that we must now look at the Bill as it stands against the background of the national economic position. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, referring to subsidies for agriculture, said the other day that economy with efficiency
…will have to be applied at the right time to the range of subsidies which fall within the field of my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 26th October, 1955; Vol. 545, c. 212.]
Grants made under the provisions of this Bill, coming, as they will be, from the Ministry of Agriculture, will obviously fall under the searching eye of the Chancellor of the Exchequer before the Bill becomes law.
I notice that the Minister said that, in considering schemes, county councils, even if they did not increase their total expenditure on highways, might be able to do something under the Bill by reducing their estimates in relation to other roads. That, of course, will depend very much upon the percentage grant that they will receive. They are not likely to transfer money from roads which at present carry a 75 per cent. grant if the Minister is to give only 50 per cent. grants under these schemes, for the reason that then they would be at a disadvantage not only in the percentage of grants received but because, for each mile of road dealt with under the Bill, they would increase their annual maintenance charges for the future since they would have to maintain the roads without receiving any grants whatsoever from the Exchequer.
It may very well be, therefore, that when these hard-headed Welshmen and


Scotsmen get together on the county councils to decide whether they will put forward schemes on the basis of turning down work on classified roads, they will not make very much headway.
I think that we have to look at the Bill, now that it has nearly completed its course, against the background of other subsidies for the hill farmers. In the light of the statement recently made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, it may well be that this Bill will prove to be a stillborn child, and that the Chancellor will say that the calf subsidies, the cattle subsidies and all the other subsidies which are now going to the hill farmers, will either have to be cut to make room for this one, or that, those subsidies having proved successful, there is no point in offering additional subsidies.
Are we coming towards the period when the subsidies to assist agriculture are to be cut? If so, then this Bill does not look like having a very healthy future. I think, too, that we must look at it against the background of declining agricultural output, because the purpose of such a Bill as this must be to assist increased agricultural production. In the light of more recent circumstances, it certainly looks as if that is not taking place.
As this is described as an experimental Measure, which cannot come into operation before 1957–58, we do not look like learning in this Parliament very much about how the Bill will operate before another Election comes along. Therefore, we shall be without that experience, and I think that the people in these areas of the Welsh hills, the Scottish hills, and the English hills will feel just as disappointed as those in other parts of agricultural England which are not getting any benefit from this Measure.

9.52 p.m.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: As the hon. Member for Caernarvon (Mr. G. Roberts) said, this Bill was first mentioned in the White Paper on Rural Wales, which was adopted in this House as far back as 8th December, 1953. It has, therefore, already taken two years for the Bill to materialise. I hope that when it eventually becomes law the rural areas of Wales, England and Scotland will derive some substantial benefit from it.
We should remember that the Bill is the only concession which the Government have made to the Council for Wales and Monmouthshire. It will be recalled that the Council made many excellent recommendations in its second memorandum, in which it dealt with the manifold problems of rural areas in the Principality, and during which it called expert evidence. I am afraid that when the memorandum came before the House, the Government paid it very scant respect.
I was glad when the Minister said that the Bill would not fall a victim to the Chancellor's axe, although I was not particularly impressed with the emphasis with which he spoke. He did not seem to be quite certain what the effect of the Chancellor's message to local authorities would be. We have been told that their capital expenditure in 1956–57 must be the same as their expenditure in 1954–55. I think that the Minister should tell us quite clearly what the effect of this message will be. Can he, this evening, give us a categorical assurance that this message will not affect the provisions of the Bill and not affect expenditure under Clause 2?
I am particularly anxious about this, because, as hon. Members will see, in Clause 2 (1) there is a stipulation that the Minister may only make grants
with the approval of the Treasury.
Exactly what does this mean? In the light of the Chancellor's present attitude, these words may have a very sinister significance. How quickly, if at all, will this approval from the Treasury be forthcoming? Will there be delays and postponements? For example, say the highway authority of Caernarvonshire puts forward a scheme next February, a modest scheme, involving an expenditure of about £5,000. How long would it take for the Minister to approve that scheme?
He will have to pass it to the Treasury. How long will the scheme lie in the pigeon-holes of the Treasury before being passed back to the Minister? And, after that, how long will it take for the Minister to pass it back to the highway authority? It is now, in this debate, that the House should be told exactly what is the position. I hope that there will be expeditious action and that the administrative machinery under the Bill will be smooth and efficient. We may as well face the position that if the Chancellor's message


to local authorities affects expenditure under this Bill, or if there be undue delays and postponements, this Bill will be a dead letter.
As was said by my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown), the Chancellor's message is also important for this reason, that under Clause 1 (5) all unadopted roads which are improved under this Measure will become unclassified roads and the responsibility of the local authority. The expenditure will fall on the council and that will be in addition to the existing mileage which it is already their responsibility to repair and maintain. This being so, their responsibility obviously will be proportionately greater than in 1954–55. It will be greater in 1956–57 by the mileage which they have adopted than it was two years previously. That is the year fixed by the Chancellor in his message.
Surely, therefore, it is clear that there will be no incentive for highway authorities to take advantage of the provisions of the Bill if they know that they will have to cut down their estimate. The Minister should consider that aspect most carefully.
Subject to these reservations, I think the Bill is a good Measure so far as it goes. As was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Norfolk, South-West (Mr. Dye), it leaves out important rural areas which could do with a great deal of assistance, important counties like Anglesey, which has 281 miles of unclassified roads against 366 miles of classified roads. That is about the highest percentage in Wales, and probably about the highest percentage in the whole of the United Kingdom. We spend about 29 per cent. of our highway rates on unclassified roads. In other words, we could do with a great deal of assistance if we are to repair and maintain these highways.
When the Council for Wales published its memorandum, it envisaged that such assistance should be forthcoming to counties like Anglesey which, because they are not covered by the Hill Farming Act and the Livestock Rearing Act do not come within the provisions of this Bill. That is a great misfortune for us. I hope that the Minister will tell the House quite clearly what the position is, because, if he does not clarify the position, the highway authorities will be in great bewilderment. I trust that we shall have a

straightforward explanation from him that will make the position quite clear to all interested parties.

10.2 p.m.

Mr. T. W. Jones: Against the background of the events of the last few days in this House, I am prepared to say that this Bill "shines like a good deed in a naughty world." Tonight, the Government are giving something instead of taking, and I only wish they could give more. Indeed, I wish that when we were upstairs we could have persuaded the Minister to increase the amount that he hopes to spend from £4 million to £10 million. However, speaking as I am within 24 hours of the Chancellor's speech last night, I suppose that I must feel thankful even for small mercies.
We cannot but be glad for the advantages given to the farming community by the two famous Acts of Parliament passed by the Labour Government, the Hill Farming Act and the Livestock Rearing Act. This Bill has been framed to assist the same people, those hardworking and hardy individuals on the mountains of North Wales who eke out a living from the reluctant acres of our hill land. Furthermore, the Bill will no doubt assist our hard pressed county councils who are seeking with very inadequate resources to repair and maintain our rural roads. They are not the main arteries of the country, but, without them, our national economy would fail and falter, so dependent is our agricultural industry upon them.
I am rather concerned about the administrative details of the Bill, and I hope that the Minister will assure us tonight that its application is not to be stifled in red tape. I sincerely hope that we shall receive that assurance. I trust that when the highway authorities forward their schemes and applications they will be promptly and sympathetically dealt with so that they can get on with a long overdue job.
I would remind the House once again that in my county a penny rate does not produce even £600. Therefore, it is not idle talk, or even cloudy special pleading, to say that this is a vital matter for a constituency like the one which I have the honour to represent.
I believe that the Government have brought forward the Bill in a sincere desire to help such counties as Merioneth,


and I am prepared to give them full credit for that. It is a great pity that the Minister could not see his way clear to increase the grant to the full 100 per cent., because it is obvious that these county councils will have to maintain the roads after they have been taken over. At least the poor counties could have been given the full 100 per cent. grant. As the Minister could not see his way clear to do that, I am pleading with him to ensure that when applications are received from the poor counties they will not take more than five minutes to be considered. The very fact that an application has been made from a county whose penny rate does not produce £600 means that it should be considered seriously. Such applications should receive the full grant promised, namely, up to 85 per cent. for one type of road and up to 75 per cent. for the other.
I should like to be assured that the number of applications will have no bearing upon the amount of grant given. I am hoping that no county council will be told, "Look here, we have assisted you before on one, two or three occasions. Take it easy." I hope that the principle will be "the more the merrier." If the Government act upon that principle, I shall be satisfied. It is a sound principle. Every county council, and especially those in North Wales, should be encouraged to submit all the schemes they can think of in the interests of the farming community and, incidentally, in other interests as well.
I would remind the Minister that Merioneth's scheme relates entirely to Snowdonia. It is the ramblers who come to see our park and spend some days there who will receive the benefit of these roads, providing the Minister is as generous as I believe he intends to be. I hope that he will not disappoint me. If he is as generous as I hope and expect, I am prepared to congratulate him in having brought the Bill through to the Third Reading stage so quickly.

10.8 p.m.

Mr. E. G. Willis: My right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) pointed out that this was a very ill-thought-out Bill. That is certainly true as far as it applies to Scotland. The Bill arose from a report from the Council of Wales, and it was not

until late in the proceedings that it was decided to include Scotland; in fact, during the Second Reading debate we could get hardly any information from the Joint Under-Secretary as to how it affected Scotland. It was not until half way through the Committee stage that we really began to receive any such information.
From the speeches made by the English Ministers, and also by the Joint Under-Secretary, during the Committee stage, it would appear that very few, if any, Scottish organisations were consulted about the Bill. That is all I can assume from the speeches which were made. We have heard much about the Council of Wales, the National Farmers' Union, the Country Landowners' Association and the rest, but nothing about any consultations with Scottish organisations. Yet the Joint Under-Secretary tells us that under the Bill he expects 1,400 or 1,500 miles of roads in Scotland to be dealt with, which is one-third of the total mentioned by the Minister—if the Minister's figure includes Scotland. I do not know whether it did or not, because it was difficult to obtain that information in Committee. I assume that the Minister increased his figure from 3,000 miles on the Second Reading to 4,500 miles to include Scotland.

Mr. Amory: Mr. Amoryindicated assent.

Mr. Willis: So that is included and the one-third total provided under the Bill is for roads in Scotland. The matter has been given little consideration. That is not good enough. It is very cavalier treatment for the Scottish rural districts that are supposed to benefit by the Bill.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Belper spoke of the finances of the Bill, under which £4 million is set aside for the purposes of the Bill. If 1,500 miles of road are to be dealt with in Scotland, the sum represented will be £3 million, and if the local authorities in Scotland are to receive an average of 66 per cent. more than half the grant will have to be for Scotland. That will still leave a burden of £1 million to be found by Scottish local authorities, some of them very poor.
My hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) indicated how low rateable values were and showed that more than £1 million would have to be borne by Scottish local authorities, plus


£20,000 a year in interest charges—if they are able to borrow at 5 per cent.—while my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper pointed out the difficulties in regard to credit of some of the poorer local authorities.
What is the financial standing in the City of London of a local authority whose ld. rate produces only £65? Will it obtain its money at 5 per cent? I very much doubt it. If my right hon. Friend was right, the figure I have given is an underestimate. Therefore, the local authorities in Scotland, including the poorest of them, will be burdened by £1 million in capital charges, and by £50,000 at the very least—and probably much more—in interest charges each year. The Joint Under-Secretary knows what that will mean on the rates of the local authorities, plus charges in connection with raising the rates.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer has spoken of a circular being sent to local authorities. Suppose a county council is considering one of these roads. There may be some doubt about the importance which the county council places upon a particular road because it serves five or six farmers out of a county population of 30,000. The county council now receives a circular from the Government telling it not to increase its capital expenditure and, in fact, to cut it down. It has to decide the priority to be accorded to the respective schemes of capital development it might undertake.
We are entitled to know what advice the Government will give to the local authorities concerned. The local authorities are entitled to know whether the Government think it is important work and should be accorded a priority. A local authority has to make its decision in accordance with the Government's instructions. As I have already pointed out, its inclination, by the very nature of the work, will be to decide that it is not of very great importance and that there are schemes of greater importance.
We are entitled to know the degree of importance which the Government attaches to these proposals. We are also entitled to know—although the right hon. Gentleman tried to shirk this when my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper was speaking—what priority the Government accord to these proposals when they

come up for Government sanction. Suppose the county councils act as my right hon. Friend hoped they would, and send in a lot of schemes. Will the Minister approve them? Is he intending to use his influence with the Chancellor of the Exchequer to obtain that right hon. Gentleman's approval? If the Government are serious about this Bill that should be done. If they are not then, in fairness to the local authorities, they should say so.
As the Bill stands, and in the light of the circulars issued, we should be foolish to expect a great deal from this Measure. I think that we shall get very little from it at all. I think my hon. Friend the Member for Norfolk South-West (Mr. Dye) was right in saying that we are not likely to see anything for two or three years. This is a Bill with good intent, but it is not capable of carrying out what it seeks to do. It is a miserable Bill. The intention is good, but the instrument is a very poor one indeed.

10.18 p.m.

Mr. J. E. B. Hill: I intervene only because I do not wish it to be thought that the Bill is not thoroughly welcome among back benchers on this side. I cannot claim that the area of my constituency can, by any stretch of imagination be brought within the definition, except, possibly, in the very narrow, electoral sense of being predominantly "hilly." I welcome the Bill because it enshrines a very valuable new principle in the Statute Book. The principle, once it is on the Statute Book can be put into effective action—not necessarily this year, but over the years—as the local authorities design their priorities to bring these schemes forward. We can then, if it has worked well, press for its extension to other parts of England where the need is great though not, in my view, as urgent as in these predominantly hill farming and mountain areas which are defined.

10.19 p.m.

Mr. Watkins: We are very grateful for the lone song from the opposite back Benches. It was short and to the point, but not really critical of what the Minister will do about the grants. We would have welcomed a really forceful voice on that. We regret that in this and our earlier


debates the back benchers opposite have taken no great part, particularly when a greater proportion of them on that side than on this represent rural parts. I cannot say that for Wales because all the Members representing constituencies in rural Wales have already spoken. I am very glad that they have done so. I congratulate my hon. Friends who have spoken in this debate. Their contributions have been forceful. They have asked the Minister for categorical replies on certain matters which are of great importance to the Bill itself.
In Committee, many of us were disappointed that the Amendments which we put forward were not accepted, but, at the same time, we are grateful for two Amendments which the Minister himself moved—one which allowed a period of seven years instead of ten years in which the £4 million should be spent, and the other with regard to the highway Clause interpretation.
There is an important paragraph in the White Paper on Rural Wales which was published last week. I refer to paragraph 97 under "Agriculture." This is the first attempt that has been made by the Ministry of Agriculture to deal with roads and make grants for roads in rural districts. I am glad that the Ministry has experimented first in the livestock rearing areas, and I hope that this experiment will be extended elsewhere.
Paragraph 97 says that the Bill embodies certain principles relating to the making of grants towards classified roads and unadopted roads. I hope that the contents of the White Paper will be put into effect. However, it is left to the Minister to decide. One cannot deny the Government credit for introducing this Bill, although, as has already been said, the Council for Wales has played a very important part in bringing these matters to the notice of the Government. Although I am a member of the County Councils' Association, I must say that they have done very little in connection with this Bill, apart from turning down any recommendations which have been made. I make that observation in spite of the fact that I may be scolded next time I attend a meeting of this association.
I suggest that when considering making grants to highway authorities for improving

classified and unadopted roads the Parliamentary Secretary should bear in mind the contents of the message which has been sent to local authorities by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Minister of Housing and Local Government in connection with local authority expenditure. Hon. Members ought to recollect that the fifth paragraph states:
The aims of your review should be to ensure first, that your authority's total capital expenditure in the year 1956–57 does not exceed that of 1954–55, and, secondly, that no new works, even those already authorised, are undertaken unless your authority are satisfied that those works are urgently necessary to meet the needs of the area.
I understand that the Minister is to send a circular to all the highway authorities. I should like to know whether he is going to suggest in that circular that these works under this Bill are an urgent necessity. This is important. In reply to a Written Question on 23rd March, information was given on the amount to be allocated for expenditure on classified roads and trunk roads in all the counties of England and Wales and in Scotland.
We find that there is an increased allocation for expenditure on classified roads for 1955–56 compared with 1954–55 in the counties to which this Bill will apply. I will give the names of the Welsh counties. In Breconshire the sum is £2,000 more in 1955–56 than in 1954–55, the year under review by local authorities. In Cardiganshire it is £2,500 more, in Montgomeryshire £3,000 more, in Pembrokeshire £3,000 more and in Radnorshire £2,000 more. How can local authorities respond to the Minister's advice to try to work in extra expenditure for this new Bill when they are already overspent on the 1954–55 figures?
May we have an indication from the Parliamentary Secretary of what he will say in the circular? Will he say, "Let us have the schemes irrespective of what is to happen"? Or will he take the point of view that this is the first time the Minister of Agriculture is giving grants towards roads and, therefore, whatever the Ministry of Transport is giving, this can be counted as an extra allocation towards roads? Will he say that?
Is he prepared to say that if they cannot go to the Public Works Loan Board for loans, they can go to the Agricultural Mortgage Corporation and


that he will give every support to any loan from them? Can they go there instead of to the Public Works Loan Board? I hope we may be told when the circular will be issued, because it is a long time since we were told it was in course of preparation. There has been a Summer Recess of nearly three months. Surely the circular is ready for signature.
There may be some reactionary authorities—I will not say in Wales, but in some places—who will say, "There is a credit squeeze and we do not want to proceed with work under this Bill." Is the Minister prepared to send another circular, saying to such authorities, "We have not heard from you. Why have you not submitted schemes under this Bill, which are so important?"
In fairness to the Minister, I must say that the Bill has been welcomed throughout the country by those authorities and people who are really interested in this matter. I am interested in it and I am glad that the Bill has been brought forward. The only criticism I have seen is that the Bill will tremendously increase the value of the land to the private owner, all as a result of public money being spent on schemes of this kind. But does not that happen with all kinds of development work? I am certain that this type of improvement will be of great benefit to the countryside.
What does the Bill do? It will help to increase meat production in livestock rearing areas which provide large numbers of stock to be fattened or in the hill feeding districts. That is very important. I will give an illustration of a district in my constituency, Llanafan in Brecon-shire, where I travelled to seven farms which are receiving assistance under the Livestock Rearing Act. Not one of those farms in that area had a road to it. Children were going to school from all of those farms except one. Yet how difficult for them to go to school. How can the fertilisers be taken to the farms? How can the farms take part in the agricultural expansion programmes if there are no roads to them? If this Bill is passed and implemented it will bring such places into the first priority schemes in Breconshire.
I can think of another very important part of Breconshire. I recently visited a farm there and I was asked whether the Bill would apply to them. Naturally I

said, as a layman, it was bound to apply, because I wanted it to apply. That farm produced seed potatoes which are so urgently required. They are produced on a hill farm and are required in other parts of the country. For them these improvements would be of great importance.
We are not able to export those seed potatoes because there is no road there. This Bill will apply to this farm and will be of great assistance. It will certainly assist in the completion of schemes under the Hill Farming and Livestock Rearing Acts. As I said on Second Reading, 19 per cent. of the schemes for the mid-Wales counties cannot be proceeded with because access roads to certain farms are not good enough to enable the contractors to undertake the work.
I hope it is realised that this Bill can even be a dollar saver for our great nation. Access roads are not only vital for agricultural improvement and afforestation, but they can be of great advantage to general amenities, which are urgently required, not only for the farmer but for the farmworkers. That applies particularly to the Forestry Commission which is establishing new afforestation communities; new villages are being born and they require roads, which will assist in the work of afforestation. As the White Paper on Rural Wales says, this Measure may also assist to solve the problem of rural depopulation.
While this is of special interest to Wales, I am sure it is of equal interest to some counties in Scotland, apart from the crofting counties, and to some in England. In Wales, however, it has great significance, because, there, sheep farming is so widespread, and the mileage of road per farm unit is proportionately higher than in other parts of either Scotland or England. The climate in the mountainous areas is abnormally wet, so that because of the demand on the roads the rate burden on unclassified roads is heavy. I hope that at least half the £4 million will be applied immediately to the Welsh counties.
We all welcome this Bill, despite all the forceful and vigorous arguments put forward in an attempt to improve it. We want the Bill, and I am certain it will add much to the Acts we on this side put through. We want this to be not only a good Bill but a good and successful


experiment, which will show that the Ministry of Transport and the Minister of Agriculture can, if they put their minds to it, be equally forthcoming in doing a good job of work in improving our roads. I wish it a speedy passage in another place, with the hope that immediate consideration will be given by the highway authorities to its application, with the good wishes of the Minister of Agriculture and the Joint Parliamentary Secretary, who will see that the good work is continued.

10.34 p.m.

Mr. Nugent: My right hon. Friend and I much appreciate the words of welcome that have been given to this Bill by hon. Members opposite in giving it its Third Reading and speeding it on its way to another place. Although there were strictures here and there about what some hon. and right hon. Members felt it should contain and did not, or did contain and should not, on the whole it has received a welcome. I much appreciated the kind words of my hon. Friend the Member for Norfolk, South (Mr. J. E. B. Hill) in his welcome, too.
There is no doubt that this Bill will do good, and do it in places where it is much needed. The farms described by the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Watkins) are just the sorts of farms we want to help, where we know help is most needed. It is because we know that in these livestock rearing areas there is a special need, which is already defined and understood nationally, that we have felt it right to commit this large sum of public money to making a start on solving this very difficult problem.
I have been asked to go into greater detail on a number of these points, but I feel that I can deal with only a few tonight. The hon. Member for Brecon and Radnor asked about publication of the circular. That cannot come out until the Bill becomes law, when we shall send it out and I shall be very glad to have a copy put in the Library. I trust that it will meet with the approval of right hon. and hon. Members in all parts of the House.
I can certainly give the assurance that when my right hon. Friend receives proposals the administrative machine will be made to work as quickly as possible, with the minimum of red tape. We will

do all we can to help county councils and highways authorities, both at county level and at headquarters level, in the preparation of schemes and do all we can to expedite them. I am most anxious to see these schemes started. In Committee, we have discussed the rate of grant which my right hon. Friend and I maintain is a generous rate which will be sufficient to help county councils to deal with very difficult cases.
May I say how much I appreciate the words of the hon. Member for Merioneth (Mr. T. W. Jones) who spoke of the Bill as "shining like a good deed in a naughty world." I think that a rather nice thought and I welcome his feelings in reception of the Bill. We do intend to make it work and we do believe that it will help both sociologically and commercially in industry to facilitate transport to and from the farm.
We have purposely kept the general arrangements for grant flexible because here we are doing a pioneering job. No one can tell for sure how the Bill will work, but we have indicated that in a great many cases there will be a rate of grant of 75 per cent. and 10 per cent. higher for unadopted roads. That is a very general indication of the sort of help which county councils can get.
To clear once again doubts and confusions about the amount of money to be made available, I should say that my right hon. Friend made it clear that the total mileage we estimate which could come within the scope of the Bill is about 4,500 miles in England, Wales and Scotland and to that we expect that between 2,500 and 3,000 will probably be proposed. That is only an estimate. It is impossible to be more precise, but it is obvious that county councils will not make propositions for all kinds of roads, both classified and unadopted. I am sorry that Anglesey does not come within this at all. Anglesey has a great problem, but does not come in a livestock rearing area and we must draw the line somewhere. We may be able to help Anglesey sometime in the future.
On the basis of £2,000 per mile, which we think will be the average cost, on a 75 per cent. grant hon. Members will find that the sum for 2,500 to 3,000 miles works out at about £4 million. Therefore, I think it is adequate provision for making a start on this big and difficult job


of assisting unclassified and unadopted roads in livestock rearing areas.
I conclude by thanking the House for the reception given the Bill and hope that it may be speeded on its way by the House giving it its Third Reading.

10.40 p.m.

Mr. Thomas Fraser: The Joint Parliamentary Secretary has omitted to answer the biggest question asked during the Third Reading debate, that put to his right hon. Friend as to whether the message which went out to the local authorities dated 26th October, some time after the Bill was introduced into the House, had any bearing whatever on the Bill. My hon. Friend the Member for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Watkins), in his excellent winding-up speech immediately before the Joint Parliamentary Secretary replied, actually read out the relevant passage in the letter sent to authorities in England and Wales. There was an exactly similar paragraph in the communication sent by the Secretary of State and the Chancellor to local authorities in Scotland.
There it is made abundantly clear that the total capital expenditure to be incurred by those authorities for the year 1956–57 ought not to exceed the expenditure for last year, 1954–55. There have been many increases in costs since then. Therefore, it is clear that less work of a capital nature is to be done in 1956–57 than was done in 1954–55.
Since this is completely new work which local authorities could not know was coming along, we are entitled to know whether a further exception is to be made to the letter sent out only a few days ago. If there is to be no exception and the letter is not to be superseded by another communication to state that this does not apply to schemes under the Bill, we have been wasting our time and might just as well not pass the Bill.
The Joint Parliamentary Secretary did not reply to that question, which was repeated by all my hon. Friends who spoke after my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown), who put it directly to the Minister after his speech moving the Third Reading. It may be a little inconvenient for the Joint Parliamentary Secretary or the Minister to reply to the question at this moment. However, there is another Minister on the

Government Front Bench who has an interest in the Bill. I have never known a Scottish Minister to play so small a part in an agricultural Bill having application to Scotland.

Mr. G. Brown: The Joint Under-Secretary did not even answer Scottish hon. Members.

Mr. Fraser: I have never known a Minister get off so lightly. I will now give him an opportunity to say a last word and tell us, for Scotland at least if he cannot also speak for England and Wales, whether the letter of 26th October sent out by his right hon. Friend means what it says or not. If it means what it says, then the Scottish county councils are being told "No schemes under the Bill."
If they are expected to submit schemes—let the Joint Under-Secretary say tonight whether they are—they must be new schemes additional to any existing works which they have had in mind. It should be borne in mind that the circular says that they have to cut back existing work because the total capital expenditure for next year has to be no more than that for 1954–55, and that for 1955–56 exceeds that for 1954–55. We ought to get these matters cleared up.
While the Joint Under-Secretary is collecting his thoughts to reply to the most important point raised in the debate, perhaps I might say that it has been clear from the outset that the Bill was intended originally to apply only to Wales. That is not denied. Welsh local authorities have had a right for the last two years to expect that the Bill would come along and that there would be provision in it for Government assistance to the county councils and other local authorities in Wales for the improvement of agricultural roads in the hill areas.
The Minister, however, has made it clear that he, as the Minister responsible for Welsh agriculture, could not very well do this for Wales alone without doing it for the hill areas in England. Therefore, we had it done for England and, for some strange reason that cannot be explained, the Secretary of State for Scotland decided to tag on to the Bill too. But the Government forgot to increase the sum of money available. In any case, we in Scotland hope that


hon. Members who represent Welsh constituencies will do well under the Bill. We hope that they will have the first share of the money and that when they have dealt with the problem in Wales there will be no money left for any other part of the country. The Bill does not apply to the crofting counties, because we have this kind of assistance there already.

Mr. William Ross: And those counties have not got the roads.

Mr. Fraser: They have not got the roads because the county councils in those counties say that it is not good enough to give 75 per cent. grant only towards the improvement of roads.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Charles MacAndrew): Are we not discussing something that is not in the Bill?

Mr. Fraser: There is provision in the Bill to exclude the crofting counties, and there must be a reason for that.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: There may be a reason, but they are not in the Bill.

Mr. Fraser: The provision to exclude them is in the Bill, but I do not want to get out of order. In any case, I tell my hon. Friends who represent Welsh constituencies that a provision similar to that contained in the Bill has applied over a large part of Scotland for many years, but it has not been greatly used or widely welcomed there because it is not supported by a grant for maintenance.
I attended a conference of the association which represents district councils in Scotland in the constituency of the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland, the hon. Member for Dumfries (Mr. N. Macpherson), during the Recess. The hon. Gentleman had an invitation to attend that conference, but apparently he was employed elsewhere. I listened to councillors from all parts of rural Scotland dealing with this problem. I told them that this Bill was before Parliament. They said it was of no use whatever to them. They wanted a Bill which would enable the Government to contribute towards the maintenance of the roads. That has not been granted.
I say, therefore, to the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland that many of us think that when the Bill

becomes an Act it will be of little or no consequence in Scotland. I think that the hon. Gentleman knows that. I should like him to tell us whether he disagrees with that proposition. The Bill might help a little in the initial stages in Wales, and then, of course, the problem of road maintenance will become larger than ever and the Welsh will have to ask for more money. Good luck to them. By that time there may be a change of Government and they will receive more generous treatment than they are receiving from the present Government.
The Bill does not face the problem of the real needs of Scotland. If the Joint Under-Secretary's right hon. Friend had not been so foolish as to attach his name to the Bill, we might have had a Bill dealing with rural roads in Scotland which would be of some use to the rural areas. We have not got it. It is a poor way to treat Scotland. We have got accustomed to giving a lead to our friends south of the Border in these matters. We took the initiative in bringing forward the Hill Farming Bill, which the hon. Gentleman's predecessor told me across the Floor of the House would be a failure. Now his right hon. Friend has come with this Bill and says that it is necessary because of the success of the Hill Farming Act.
I say to him that there is not much reason to believe that this Bill will have any success in Scotland. I make way for him now, and invite him to tell us whether this circular, or at least the one sent out to the Scottish local authorities, means what it says, and whether there is any expectation at St. Andrew's House that this Bill will have any practical effect in Scotland.

10.51 p.m.

Mr. Amory: If I may have the permission of the House to speak again, I would say, in answer to the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser), that if we did not consider this Bill still important in its objects, we should not be asking the House to put it on the Statute Book. If we thought it would be a dead letter we should certainly not be going forward with it. I wish to repeat what I said earlier, that the decision about the priority which a local authority gives to the maintenance of its roads is a matter for the local authority. If and when proposals are put forward, I can assure the House


that they will be considered on their merits, and if a proposal is found to be within the objects of this Bill, and stands as a sound scheme, it will be approved.

Mr. G. Brown: May we get this clear, because I think that the Minister is now trying to help? The paragraph which has been read out by several of my hon. Friends and is directed to the local authorities states:
The aims of your review should be to ensure first, that your authority's total capital expenditure in the year 1956–57 does not exceed that of 1954–55.
and that no new works are undertaken unless they are urgent. The right hon. Gentleman says that priority is in the hands of the local authority. Suppose a local authority includes a scheme, but can do so only by allowing its total expenditure to rise above that of 1954–55. Will it still be allowed to go on with the scheme?

Mr. Amory: That is an hypothetical case and we shall have to consider [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] On the Contrary. I cannot add now to what I have said, that priority is a matter for the decision of the local authority. Each proposal will be considered by the Government on its merits.

Mr. T. Fraser: I asked the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland some questions, and I wonder if he would be good enough to reply. It is customary for a Scottish Minister to speak.

10.54 p.m.

Mr. William Ross: I have been anxiously waiting to know how the Scottish Office regards this Bill. We have heard two English Ministers but, with respect to the Minister of Agriculture his rule does not run in Scotland. His Department has no power to interfere with the Scottish county councils. I do not wish to make a speech, but I want to listen to the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland telling us how he interprets this Bill in the light of the message of his right hon Friends the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Secretary of State for Scotland which was sent to the Scottish local authorities. In that message they said categorically that no new works, even those authorised, would be started, except those of exceptional urgency.
How does he interpret anything that might be done under the Bill in the light of this recent circular? What will be the position? The Minister of Agriculture said that the Government felt that the Bill was important. It certainly is; that is why we supported it—but we want to know now when the work is to be done. My Welsh colleagues are anxious to tell the people who are vitally concerned whether anything is to be done this year, next year, or at some time in the distant future. I ask the Joint Under-Secretary a simple question. How are the people who are dependent upon the improvement of these rural roads to be affected next year by the Bill, in the light of the message to local authorities? Could we have an answer to that question?

10.56 p.m.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Niall Macpherson): It is rather unusual to have three Government Front Bench speeches on a Third Reading debate, but I certainly do not wish to be in any way discourteous to the House or to the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser), who has put some questions to me.
I associate myself of course with my right hon. Friend in what he said about the way in which this Bill will work. It must be a matter for the local authorities to judge. The hon. Member for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Watkins) has made it quite clear that there is urgent necessity in Wales, and I have no doubt that local authorities in Scotland will judge where the urgent necessity lies there and will make applications accordingly.

Mr. Ross: But will the authorisations be automatic?

Mr. Macpherson: I think it is fair to say that there is competition in well-doing between the Department of Agriture on the one hand and my right hon. Friend's Ministry on the other. I am quite certain that the arrangements for Scotland will not in any way be behind those which my right hon. Friend is going to make for England and Wales. I am sure that they will be dealt with as expeditiously as those my right hon. Friend has in mind, and we will certainly do the same as he is doing, if any hon. Members wish it, and lay in the Library of the House a copy of the circular that will be sent out.
I am asked whether the Bill will succeed in Scotland. I would just make the point that the origin of the Bill lies in the experience which has been obtained from the crofting counties of Scotland. I think the hon. Member for Hamilton will agree that it is the procedure devised for the crofting counties which is now being applied elsewhere. The hon. Member has said that no use is being made of this in the crofting counties, but he knows that £100,000 a year is being spent in that part of the world upon the improvement of roads. I believe that good use is being made of the facilities afforded, and I see no reason whatsoever why the same use should not be made of them in other parts of Scotland.
I cannot foresee just how much use will be made of the Bill in Scotland, but I say that we are sensible people. I welcome the Bill, and very much regret that it has not been more welcomed by Scottish Members opposite. I believe that it will be good for Scotland, as it will be for Wales, and for that reason I would say that the House—from the Scottish as well as the Welsh point of view—should give it an unopposed Third Reading and a thorough welcome.

11.0 p.m.

Mr. Thomas Steele: I agree with one remark of the Joint Under-Secretary, and that was when he said that we are sensible people in Scotland. We can all agree on that but it is because we are sensible that we are making these inquiries tonight. The Under-Secretary added nothing further to the information we have had from the Minister or the Parliamentary Secretary. The question put was clear and concise, and there is no point in the Minister or the Parliamentary Secretary saying that this matter will be judged by the local authorities—that they, in effect, will decide. During the whole course of recent debates it has been made plain that the Government have been turning to some method whereby they can escape responsibility.
The answers we have had tonight make clear that the Government are trying to escape responsibility. That is an indication of the difficulty into which the Government are getting. The Bill was brought forward in good faith after a

Budget in which everything was well and good, when we were given to understand that we could look forward to years of prosperity. Wonderful things were going to happen in Wales, and in England and Scotland, too, in connection with the taking over of these roads. During the passage of the Bill we had another statement from the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and then the White Paper was issued. The terms of the White Paper were a direct opposite to the speeches made by the Minister. The White Paper is clear. It says:
The aims of your review should be to ensure first, that your authority's total capital expenditure in the year 1956–57 does not exceed that of 1954–55 …
As the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) pointed out, the 1954–55 figure was less than that of the present year. How are we going to say to the local authorities, "You have to prune the work you are doing, and at the same time you have to take advantage of this Bill and increase your expenditure, and also decide what is to have priority"? This is a clear indication of the difficulty into which the Government are getting. Frankly, we ought to have another speech from the Minister. I am sure we would permit him to make another speech, if he is prepared to say categorically that he will go to the Chancellor of the Exchequer and say that the purpose of this Bill is going to be carried out.
It may be, of course, that the saving in subsidies for farmers will provide the money for this to be carried out. I appreciate, however, that that is not a matter we are discussing at present, but farmers are interested in this Bill, as they are in what is going to happen in February. It is understandable that they will probably have less money with which to pay the rates necessary to find the money for their contribution. We ought to have another speech at least to make clear that the Government have decided to go ahead. There is another Under-Secretary and even a representative from the Ministry of Food present, and the latter must have some interest in this Measure and might be able to enlighten us.

Bill accordingly read the Third time.

Orders of the Day — NURSES (TRAINING)

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. R. Thompson.]

11.6 p.m.

Mr. Julian Snow: I desire to raise tonight the question of pre-nurse training education. I see the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health hurrying forward, and, Heaven knows, we have waited long enough.
This subject was brought to my urgent attention during the summer when I happened to attend a hospital fête in my constituency. I got into conversation with a regional nursing officer who took time off to describe to me her anxieties about nursing and student-nurse recruitment.
During the Summer Recess I collected a certain number of opinions on this urgent problem, and, to fortify myself for tonight's Adjournment debate, I yesterday, as the hon. Lady the Parliamentary Secretary knows, put down some exploratory Questions and sought to obtain information as to the exact statistical aspect of the nursing recruitment problem.
It was yesterday disclosed that, according to the latest information at the disposal of the Government, there are no less than 17,043 hospital beds which are not at present occupied because of the shortage of nursing staff. To put the problem in another way, the number of nurses needed to operate all available hospital beds in England and Wales amounts to 31,000. That is a fantastic figure, which can be split up into 21,000 nurses who are needed for general nursing duties and 10,000 for mental nursing.
In the context of this Adjournment Motion, I want to restrict myself to general nursing and to the question of the recruitment of female nurses. But I am considerably concerned at the apparent difference of opinion which exists among people who are at the top of the nursing profession. I am not at all sure that there is clear thinking in the Ministry itself on this matter, because one of the Questions I put to the Minister of Health, and which was replied to by the hon. Lady, concerned

the matter of the sort of policy which the Government would wish to encourage regarding the pre-nurse training education.
I asked whether it was left to local discretion to decide whether an adequate supply of nurses was best produced by pre-nursing training in schools or by nursing cadet schemes. In her reply, the hon. Lady restricted herself to a comment about cadet schemes. I am rather puzzled at that reply, because I should have thought that my Question was quite clear and that I was differentiating between cadet schemes and courses run at schools for girls who have reached a somewhat later age than the age at which girls can go into these cadet schemes.
In the time at my disposal it is very difficult to cover the whole problem, but it seems to me that there is a pretty strong case for giving further encouragement to the running of these school courses for girls who are at least 17 years of age. My only doubt about the matter is that while it is true to say that there has been a big increase in these cadet schemes which permit girls to start at a younger age, nevertheless we cannot go on as we are. We simply are not finding enough girls who eventually get to the age of 18 and start off on their student-nurse training.
I am not sure that a big case has not been made out by the people who are enthusiastic about school courses. As a result of an investigation carried out in 1952 by the King Edward's Hospital Fund for London, when it analysed where the girls came from who started student-nurse training, it was found that nearly 53 per cent. came from other employment, nearly 5 per cent. from children's nurseries, 27 per cent. from schools, and just over 5 per cent. from cadet schemes. The significant figure is that 53 per cent., more than half, came from other employment.
If we examine those figures further we find that no less than 86 per cent. were aged between 18 and 25. The conclusion drawn was that a large number of girls can be attracted who are already in some form of employment and will be prepared to come into student-nurse training. That is a very strong argument indeed.
In the other type of scheme, the cadet scheme, the significant fact is that a very dangerous policy is advocated by the


Government. I rely for my information upon Ministry of Health Circular No. 69 of 1954, which I assume is still current, with special reference to paragraph 5. There is a very pernicious doctrine at the beginning of that paragraph. Discussing the conditions of employment of the cadet nurses, it says:
Moreover, where the young persons are, in fact, effectively employed, their rate of remuneration should be commensurate with the amount of service they render.
Are these schemes to provide labour which can be used usefully in hospitals, or to provide a pool of girls who, at the end of their cadet training, will be fit to start their student-nurse training at the age of 18? To use the yardstick of the amount of service they can render is quite wrong.
Another thing concerns me. In paragraph 8 of that circular is a scale of payments to these cadets, starting with £150 per annum at the age of 15. I will talk about the special requirements of highly industrialised and prosperous areas in a moment; I want the hon. Lady the Parliamentary Secretary to compare that sort of salary with the declared policy of the Government as stated in the same circular, of trying to encourage girls to stay on at school and get a more advanced education.
What happens to a girl whose parents are encouraged to keep her at school up to 17? She is able, in a local education area, to obtain, after a means test, a maintenance grant, which I am informed may amount on the average to £25 a year. There is a financial inducement right away to a girl not to carry on at school but to enter a cadet scheme. I will not elaborate on the statistics, which I think are available to the hon. Lady, regarding wastage in cadet schemes, but I would draw attention to the fact that it seems a funny way to try to encourage girls to stay at school if the maintenance grants do not compare with the salaries available to the girls.
In the Midlands area in which my constituency is, and where there is a nursing shortage, the nursing authorities have to cope with the extremely high industrial wages available to the young girls. So I am prepared to accept that there is a special problem there. But there is also a further difficulty, and this refers to the

cadets. Under the cadet system, the girls are allowed to attend, free as it were, a local education class once a week; but if it is the opinion of the authorities running the scheme that a girl should attend more than one day a week, her pay is cut. The result is that straight away there is what one might term an inhibition against further education.
I am anxious to use this Adjournment debate as a method of exploration. I am not an authority on this problem, but I know that there is an acute shortage of nurses and that the Government's present policy does not seem to be achieving much success. I am most anxious to help in any way that I can, and, to me, there appear to be three possibilities. First, so far as the school courses are concerned—that is, for the 17-plus category—there should be an improvement in the maintenance grants offered by the local education authority. That, I know, is not the responsibility of the hon. Lady the Parliamentary Secretary, but perhaps she would accept it as something worth discussing with her governmental colleagues, at the same time drawing attention to the disparity which exists with the cadet scales.
To put that in another way; there should be further education—that is, more than one day a week—without penalising whatever salary scales are agreed for the cadet scheme. I certainly have no desire to create prejudice against this cadet scheme, but I must say that I was astonished and appalled to read in the circular of 1954, from which I have quoted, of bad cases of mis-employment of young girls. An example is such as the case quoted in the circular of two girls under 18 years of age who had to attend a post-mortem examination. There are other cases quoted which I will not go into here tonight.
I have suggested two improvements. The third is to combine things on a national plan basis, because I think it is true that we are losing the battle to some extent by not having a national plan; there is too much variation in local practice. In parenthesis, I might here say that the House would probably like to know of the York and Tadcaster scheme which is for girls in other employment and is for training by means of evening classes. Hon. Members might also draw a moral from the high percentage of successes


from that scheme, and I am sorry that the Parliamentary Secretary has said that so much is left to the local authorities. This is such a vital problem that some lead should be given by the local authorities. The Government, as hon. Members know, is in financial difficulties, and those on both sides of the House who want to see the National Health Service a success will be disquieted by the answer which the Parliamentary Secretary gave to my question yesterday.
We know that the Government have to cut expenditure, but I cannot help thinking that in the case of the nursing service in the hospitals a real start should be made in tackling this serious deficiency which, if not tackled, is going to affect the whole course of the hospital service. In conclusion, I hope that the hon. Lady will be able to say tonight how far the Government are prepared to go against their declared policy of cutting back expenditure in this direction so that we shall have a sufficient staff of nurses in our hospitals.

11.20 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health (Miss Patricia Hornsby-Smith): I am grateful to the hon. Member for Lichfield and Tamworth (Mr. Snow) for initiating this debate, on a subject which we in the Ministry regard as of very great importance, and for the reasoned manner in which he has put his case. First, I think it is fair to point out that there has been a substantial improvement in the recruitment of nurses, and if I may I should like to give the figures for 1949 and 1954, which show that on the general nursing side, in which the hon. Member has been most interested this evening, the number of full-time registered nurses has risen from 28,000 to 36,000, student nurses from 40,000 to 44,000, all full-time nursing staff from 93,000 to 110,000 and part-time from 14,000 to 20,000. I do not deny that the picture on the mental nursing side is nowhere near as favourable, and had I the time I would willingly give those figures, but the hon. Gentleman has deliberately dealt with the general nursing side this evening and I propose to reply on that basis.
The annual intake of student nurses is averaging at the moment about 18,000, and with the increasing demands from other and, in many

respects, new professions for women, it is unlikely that we shall be able to get much variation in the average intake. A really vital problem is, not so much the hope that we might greatly increase the annual intake, but that we shall be able to cut down on the wastage; and, bearing in mind the age groups that will come in the 18 years and 19 years class within the next few years, the cutting down of wastage offers the best opportunity for increasing our total complement of nurses. I confess that the largest single component of wastage is matrimony, which is the biggest headache of our nursing problem, and is something beyond our control, about which we can do nothing. The hon. Gentleman is aware, of course, of the Nuffield job analysis and the efforts and pioneer schemes being operated in order to see that nurse's skill is used on skilled jobs, and that, where possible, less skilled staff are used where medical skills and nursing skills are not required.
Before dealing with the various sections to which the hon. Gentleman has referred, I should like to emphasise a point he himself made, that a not inconsiderable number of men and women are taking up nursing at a later age, and there has been a marked increase in the number of over 20's who have entered the nursing profession. Many of them have tried other jobs and found they did not satisfy their sense of vocation, and, having had this outside experience and changed from their own choice, they tend to make absolutely first-class nurses.
Now may I deal with the problem of the under 18's. First I want to emphasise that this problem involves the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education, who are vitally concerned so long as the training of nurses is under educational auspices, and also the Ministry of Labour and National Service. We do not take a rigid view, saying that there should be a rigid national formula laid down as to the best method in all areas, because circumstances vary from the highly industrialised areas—where there is the opportunity for young people to go into light engineering, or work of that nature, at a comparatively young age—to rural areas. They vary too amongst large hospitals and small.
Cadet schemes can be a success in large hospitals, but they are often not a great success in small hospitals. They vary, too,


where the co-operation between hospital and educational authorities is on a very high and satisfactory basis. We believe that there must be some elasticity, and there must be a very full consideration of local knowledge, of their hospitals and their education facilities, and of the possibility of attracting young people under any one of these three methods.
First there are those who continue full-time education until they are 18. I say quite emphatically—we have made our opinion well known—that we regard this as the best preparation for the boy or girl wishing to become a nurse. It can be by a special pre-nursing course at school or at a further education establishment. These pre-nursing courses are approved by the General Nursing Council and recommended by the Ministry of Education, and the Ministry of Labour have published an excellent pamphlet on the subject, which I am sure the hon. Member would be interested to see. A girl who takes one of these courses can sit for Part I of the preliminary examination before she starts training in hospital.
In addition, the General Nursing Council made a new rule in 1953, that those who take a specified subject such as anatomy and physiology with hygiene in the General Certificate of Education may be exempted from Part I of the preliminary examination.
For those who cannot continue in full-time education, the further education establishments run part-time day and evening courses, again approved by the General Nursing Council. There are also courses run preparatory to pre-nursing courses and other preliminary nursing courses of general education with a bias towards nursing subjects. So there is a wide field offered in the educational facilities in consultation with the General Nursing Council to give girls an opportunity of taking pre-nursing training.
It is true that there are no special financial arrangements for the special pre-nursing courses whether part-time or full-time run by further education establishments. Whether they will qualify for ordinary educational grants is, as the hon. Member admitted, a matter for the Minister of Education, but I think it fair to ask where we are to end if we start paying, however small it is, a wage level to girls or boys doing education courses?

How many professions now have a shortage and can ask why they should not be given an opportunity and why not give them the same increased grants, if for example they are going in for teaching or any of the many professions and skilled jobs where there is an acute shortage? It is a very vast problem and it would be a very major step to suggest that what is tantamount to wages should be paid to people when in fact they are receiving education under the State.
Expenditure by local authorities on further education, including pre-nursing, is something which comes under the normal Exchequer grants. I do not think it unreasonable to maintain the principle that one pupil should be on the same footing as another and that education should rank for normal education grants and not anything akin to a wage.

Mr. Snow: Would the hon. Lady address herself to the question of the balance between cadet salary scales and maintenance grants for older girls continuing their education?

Miss Hornsby-Smith: That surely applies not merely to nursing. If a girl leaves at 15 or 16 and goes into some form of employment she is paid, and if she stays at school until she is 18 she possibly receives an education grant but does not qualify in any form for a wage. I frankly do not think it practicable to discriminate between one student and another. If, on the other hand, a girl leaves school at 15 or 16 and goes into a cadet scheme—some of which, as the hon. Member says, have been highly successful and some not quite so successful—she is providing a service within the hospital.
May I clear up a point raised by the hon. Member about paragraph 5 of the circular? Here again there is a very real difficulty between the person on the pre-nursing course and the person on a cadet course. They are allowed one day a week from their cadet training to go to pre-nursing educational training without any reduction—it is now £160 in the first year having gone up by £10 since the circular was issued. On the other hand, when they are away for two or three days their salary is accordingly deducted. Otherwise, the disparity would be greater and the encouragement would be for people not to go for pre-nursing courses


but go into cadet schemes where they were available. That I appreciate, and we have endeavoured to meet the point where cadets are going into pre-nursing courses and not rendering service in the hospitals.
The hon. Member will be aware of the volume of complaints which there would be if cadets in the hospitals were rendering such services as they do—non-nursing services as laid down under the regulations—and were not given any form of remuneration for so doing. This is a problem, I accept, but I do not think the solution lies in discriminating between pupil and pupil in an educational scheme.
There is a very strong body of opinion which feels that it is in the best interests of people going in for nursing that they should have spent two years outside the hospital in some other vocation before going into nursing. That view is sincerely held by many people.
On the other hand, there have been areas faced with an acute shortage of nursing staff and the keenest competition from industry to take young people at an early age, where it has been felt that the only solution was an adequate and properly controlled cadet scheme. In that respect, Manchester has conducted an admirable scheme with considerable success.
The hospitals are free to recruit school leavers into the cadet schemes. They are a way of attracting to nursing those who for some reason or another feel that they have to leave school at 16 and want to go into nursing rather than to take up an alternative job until they are 18.
As I emphasised, the conditions are clearly defined and laid down, and they have been more strongly enforced since the Report to which the hon. Gentleman referred. I accept that there were some unsatisfactory schemes, but we have taken strong action in concert with the General Nursing Council, and he will now find that on the whole they are very satisfactorily conducted.

Mr. Snow: I did not make heavy weather of that.

Miss Hornsby-Smith: No, but in case it should be thought to be otherwise outside, I should like it to be known that the Regulations are very strict.
There is yet another way in which girls interested in nursing can get some pre-nursing training, either in nursery nursing or in the voluntary aid societies.
I should like to say a word about the York and Tadcaster scheme. As I said yesterday, the area is to be congratulated upon its success. This is a case where it is a matter of local pride and very real additional voluntary service as against anything laid down by the Ministry. The scheme has been run with the close co-operation of the hospital management committee and the local education authority, and two parallel courses are run at two hospitals in winter sessions for those who leave school, are perhaps in other jobs and are inclined to take up nursing.
It takes up a great deal of the free time of the staff. It has arisen out of the voluntary desire of the staff to do its utmost for its local hospital, and that is probably one of the reasons for the success of the scheme, whereas if we were to try to impose a scheme nationally which depended on such effort, it might not be as readily forthcoming or as applicable from area to area as has the Tadcaster scheme in its area. We hope that the publicity given to it and the knowledge of its success will lead to its being copied in other areas where similar conditions apply.
I would say that, generally speaking, we have been steadily increasing the number of nurses. We are engaged in wide local publicity because we have found from experience that the best publicity is that centred round the needy spots. We have many good spots which have made up their complement. We are fully alive to the difficulties of highly industrial areas such as Birmingham. I assure the hon. Member that we believe that by our three-fold policy, by elasticity and by the co-operation which the Ministry can give to individual schemes seeking to solve local problems we shall obtain the best results.

The Question having been proposed after Ten o'clock and the Debate having continued for half an hour, Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Adjourned at twenty-six minutes to Twelve o'clock.